MAX: The ICBG
by Supa Supa Bad Truly Mad Moves
Summary: PART 1: Max is under a lot of pressure. From the flock, who want a normal life. From Fang, who has developed a desire for physical love. And from a strange group called the ICBG, who really, really want Max to be their friend... at any cost necessary.
1. Chapter 1

**MAX: The ICBG**

**Disclaimer: **Maximum Ride belongs to James Patterson. Is that really necessary? How much legal trouble can this place get in, really?

**Okay. S. S. B. T. M. M. here, with a brand-new story. I am originally the author of a little crossover saga that combines the classic recipe of **_**Maximum Ride**_** and **_**Twilight**_**, with **_**Monsters vs. Aliens**_** thrown in for zest. It's pretty good, actually. Take a look at it if you've got the resources.**

**But if not, here's some just plain Max-ness. I must say, it's probably going to be difficult to write about a Max who doesn't go to Ginormica for woman-to-woman advice. I've become accustomed to it. Anyway, I'll probably recycle a couple of jokes and plot devices from the Three-Way Saga, so apologies for the folks who have already read that one. But needless to say, that's not very many people.**

**When I began the Three-Way Saga, I had not read the fifth book of the **_**Maximum Ride**_** series, and I put off reading it for a while so that it would not interfere with my mindset. I have read it now, so we're talking post-MAX here.**

**Chapter 1**

The Big Guy skittered over to the mirror, greeted as always by a man-sized powder-blue gecko with surprisingly human eyes.

"Hello, handsome," he said, fingering the ICBG logo on his shirt. "Here's a face that belongs on currency, eh? Yes, we'll be respected soon enough."

"You talking to yourself again, Big Guy?" said a voice from outside his private quarters.

"To my reflection, actually," the Big Guy called back. "Come on in, Jewel."

Jewel entered the room, his eyes surveying the room briefly—a habit that he had picked up all on his own. Jewel was the Big Guy's pet project, his little 180-billion-dollar baby. Everything the Big Guy had created in the thirty years since Jewel's official birthday paled in comparison. But the Big Guy needed no extra satisfaction—he had his precious little Jewel.

Jewel was a robot, with a supercomputer rivaling any but the most phenomenal of human brains. He had thoughts, opinions, and a personality that over the years had begun to deviate slowly from those of his creator. A synthetic being, but that wasn't why he was worth 180 billion dollars. The Big Guy didn't cut corners—Jewel's exterior had been made of rubies and diamonds, and his most recent modifications, spidery mandibles and an extra set of arms, were sculpted from pearl.

"We've located the flock," Jewel said. "What do we do? Shoot at 'em?"

The Big Guy raised his eyebrows. "Certainly not, Jewel. We're not going to attack them." He looked at the photo of the six bird kids that took up his entire east wall. "They get to expecting that, you know," he said. "Poor little things… no, we need them to know that we're different from the rest. That we are very, very good friends of theirs."

Jewel cocked his head. "Are we?"

The Big Guy grinned. "For their sake, we had better be."


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

I looked up to see five angelic figures forming a tight circle around me. They landed in perfect sync, surrounding me. I smiled at them. My perfect little family.

"What are you buzzards up to?" I asked.

"We've been talking," Iggy said.

"Without me?" I said.

"That's sort of the idea, Max," Nudge said. "The five of us have unanimously decided that, it being January and schools all over the country preparing to return from winter break… we wanna go. To school, I mean. The Day and Night School."

I looked around at them. Five faces showing perfect conviction. Well, four with perfect conviction and one with no expression at all. Guess.

"That's not gonna happen, folks," I said. "Will that be all?"

"No, it's gonna happen, Max," Iggy said. "It was unanimous."

"Uh, no it wasn't," I said. "I didn't agree to this. And the thing about this democracy is: Max gets six votes. No school. We're going to stay here until 'here' becomes too dangerous, then we're moving on until we find a new place to hang out, and the process is repeated. That's flock life. I'm used to it. The rest of you ought to get used to it."

Fang stepped up to me and squeezed my shoulder from arm's length. Whoops, there it goes… heart racing, knees knocking. And the secure knowledge that someone would see my side.

Fang looked me in the eye, took a deep breath, and said, "No."

"What?" I demanded.

The five of them turned on their heels and dropped single-file off the edge of the dock where I had been standing. Nudge, Gazzy, and Angel flew off into the rising sun on the ocean.

I shot straight into the air and caught a wind current. "You get back here!" I yelled. "You call me the flock leader and you act like you mean it, so I expect you to do what I say. Get back here right now, you punk kids!"

Nudge spun around and jabbed a finger to my chest. For the first time that day, I noticed that she was wearing a bit too much eyeliner and that her lipstick was the perfect shade of pink. That was a secondary observation. The primary observation was that her face was contorted with rage.

"This is really important to us, Max," she said, snarling while simultaneously choking on tears. "To all of us. We really want to do this, and if you care about us _at all_, you'll support us in this decision." She kicked me hard in the chest before turning back to join the youngest kids.

Flock life had given me a glimpse of just about every stage on the emotional spectrum, but I was pretty sure that this was the first time I had ever seen Nudge so completely furious. I hoped I'd never see it again. It wasn't scary exactly, but it sure as hell broke my heart.

"Nudge," I called to her. "How can you say that? You know how much I love you…"

Iggy and Fang floated up to my eye level. "Don't think we're just walking out on you, Max," Iggy said. "You have a choice in the matter. You can come with us to school, or you can be alone forever. Take your pick. We've got time." He broke away to catch up with the others, leaving me alone with Fang.

"Fang, I—" He held up a hand to silence me. He didn't say a word. Instead, he drew me close and kissed me. It wasn't the passionate-but-respectful kiss that I was used to (or could never possibly get used to, but you know what I mean) but aggressive and brief, ending with a scrape and a loud smack. Fang gave me a long, hard look, presumably to memorize my stunned expression, and turned away.

I'm no psychologist, but it was pretty easy to read the underlying message of that kiss, and the message was "buh-bye".

I stared at the five retreating figures. "You guys can't do this to me," I called. "Please, you know why we can't do this. I… I've explained this…" My voice trailed away. "We can't go to school," I whispered. "You guys know it's too dangerous…"

I sighed and pumped my shoulders. The extra ones, the ones with feathers on 'em. With my super-duper top speed, I caught up to the flock in a few seconds.

"Fine, you guys win," I said, taking the point position. "Just… don't gang up on me like that again."

"Or what?" Iggy said. "You'll give up again?"

I didn't bother to scowl at him. He probably imagined that I look scarier than I really do anyway. I reached for Fang's hand. He took it and gave me a little twitch of the mouth. "Thank you," he said.

This must have meant a lot to him. Two words? He could just as easily have said "Thanks."

"I know this is a good idea," Angel said. "We should be smart."

"I learned a lot in the little time I was there," Nudge said. "All of us can definitely benefit from some—"

"Fine, fine," I said, waving a hand. "Don't push your luck, kiddies. I'm coming to school with you, but I'm not letting my guard down, and I'm not gonna like it, all right?"

Iggy smirked. "I wouldn't mind putting some money on that."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

I slipped into a seat in the eighth-grade first-hour class, for the second day in a row. This specialized Day and Night School thingy was all that was promised and more. A perfect, specialized learning program. It got us flawlessly into the proper mindset for useful learning.

So, naturally, I despised the place right down to the core of my soul.

"Hi, Max," said the girl next to me. She had black hair and thick glasses, and carried around an immense amount of books. "I always wanted to meet you. I'm Keegan."

"I'm Max," I replied. "But you knew that."

"How did you enjoy your first day here?" she said.

"Well, after I got over the fact that coming here goes against my very survival, it's fine," I grumbled.

Keegan frowned. "I noticed that you've been kind of upset since you got here."

"It's the flock," I said. "The other bird kids. They forced this on me. They want to hit the books bad."

"And you don't think you need that?" she said.

"That's right," I said. "Not to mention how dangerous things get when the flock remains stationary. It just doesn't work."

"I think this would be good for you, though," Keegan said. "I mean, you're street smart, but that's not all that it takes if you're trying to make a difference in the world."

"I'm not _just_ street smart," I muttered. "If I went to Venice, I'd be canal smart."

Keegan laughed. It was a nice sound, like a bell. Not the big abrasive kind of bell, but little tinkling bells. "That's funny," she said. "Can I write that down?"

"Write that down?" I repeated. "Look, kid, I don't even know how you managed to get this far. I don't even know you. Okay? And no matter how well I know you, you can't be trusted." She looked upset, like maybe I'd hurt her pretty little feelings.

Which, I quickly realized, I had. Her wounded expression was so sincere and pained that it instantly made me regret my words. I felt the need to clarify. "Don't take it personally, kid," I said. "It's just that I don't trust _anybody_."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

I quickly located the flock in the cafeteria. Holding a loaded tray in each hand (balanced meal! no? okay) I plopped down and realized, to my horror, that there were more than six kids at the table.

"What's all this, then?" I demanded. "What have I told you guys? No, no, no, no, no…" I brought my trays to a different table, and shot the flock a glare that simply dared them to stay where they were.

Gazzy was the first to follow me to the empty table. "What's going on, Max?"

"I already told you, don't push your luck," I told them. "I agreed we were going to school, but we do _not_ make friends, all right? That rule is inflexible."

"That's not fair, Max," Nudge said. "You have a mother and a sister… and Fang. We all deserve friends outside the flock."

"I'm sorry, Nudge," I said. "It may seem unfair, but it's just about our safety." I paused. "What did you mean by… that part about Fang?"

Nudge hesitated. Cue alarm bells.

"Spill, Nudge," I said, concerned.

"What I meant was, that Fang is… you know, more than just another flock member to you."

"There's no such thing as _just_ a flock member," I said quickly.

"You know what I mean! And I… I kind of…" Nudge bit her lip, her eyes averted.

"Tell her, Nudge," Angel said soothingly.

"There's this guy Aaron," she said. "I met him when I was here last time, and I… I really like him a lot, Max."

My grip on Fang's hand tightened. I hadn't even realized we had been holding hands. Sometimes he carries the concept of stealth to a whole new level.

Nudge with a crush? It was easy to imagine. Cute and simple.

Dangerous.

"Don't, Max," Nudge said, holding up a hand. "I know what you're thinking, and thank you so much for your concern, but the fact is you don't really have any kind of authority over anyone here. I'm gonna go sit with Aaron." She turned to go.

"Nudge, that's not what I was gonna say," I said hurriedly.

That was a bluff. But her hesitation gave me room to think. I stepped up to her and gave her a hug. "Just be careful, okay, baby?" I said.

She brightened and rushed eagerly back to the other table. I saw Aaron; he had very tan skin and spiky black hair. His eyes were as enthusiastic as Nudge's—an immediate sign that he was a rare breed.

"Was that a blessing, Max?" Fang asked, amused.

"Not quite," I said. "Angel, you're keeping an eye on this guy?"

She nodded. "He doesn't seem evil, but you know I miss stuff sometimes."

"Well, 'not evil' is better than we can say about most people we're familiar with," I said. "It'll have to do for now."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

Fang tapped my desk. "Hey," he said. "Wanna go fly around, just the two of us?"

I snapped my pencil cleanly in half. Dreadful homework. "Absolutely," I said, standing up to give him a kiss.

We hopped out the dormitory windows. Yup, dormitory. Again, dreadful.

Well, this was it. Probably the most romantic thing anybody's ever done—we went out and we flew around.

Not many words were exchanged. We didn't need to. He knew how insanely, freakishly in love with him I was. And that's not the sort of thing you say aloud to a dude like Fang in any case. I took his hand and we rotated on our axis, staring into each other's eyes.

"Whoa," I said. "Fang, what's that?"

He followed my gaze over his shoulder. "Albatross," he said.

I didn't take my eyes off the approaching figure. I tried to gauge its distance. Quickly, I realized that my raptor vision, with its kick-ass depth perception, doesn't make mistakes.

"Fang…" I said slowly. "An albatross doesn't have a sixty-foot wingspan."

He gave it a good look this time. "Damn," he muttered.

"Go, go, go!" I said quickly. We tried to take off, but the giant mutant bird ('cause, honestly, what else could it have been?) dive-bombed us and grabbed us in its webbed feet. We struggled, but it was huge and strong. I twisted, looking up at it, and gasped. It looked exactly like a seagull, but seven feet tall and with an enormous wingspan—and its eyes were completely human. Brown eyes like mine. Freaky eyes on a bird.

We fought with it the entire fifteen minutes that it flew. Finally, it came to a large airplane, and tucking in its wings slid into a hatch in the plane's belly. The bird pinned Fang and I facedown to the floor of the cabin.

"Thank you, Albert," said a cruel female voice.

"No problem," answered a male voice with a thick Boston accent. The bird feet lifted from our backs.

"Help them up, Danny," said the woman's voice.

I found myself lifted to my feet by a pair of tentacles. Glancing to the side, I saw that it was a giant octopus, with bright red skin and odd eyes—round and lidless, like a normal octopus, but with that same odd human-ness of the seagull's.

Approaching us was a frog. It walked on two legs and was eight feet tall. Bright green with bulbous red eyes, also freaky. Unlike the other two human-eyed creatures, the frog was wearing clothes; a dark blue pantsuit marked with an insignia: "ICBG" encased in an oval.

"Hello, Max," the frog said—that was where the woman's voice had come from. "Do sit down."

The octopus lowered us down into chairs. I was already too tired to resist.

A few things occurred to me—these mutants were flawless. They didn't have the stitched-together look of the winged Erasers, nor were they completely screwed up like the Krelp (please don't tell them I called them that). Rather, they were perfect blends of human and animal.

The other thing that struck me were the names. Albert, Danny. Normal names, not the kind that people tack onto mutants… or that mutants tack onto themselves. Hey, I'm aware that "Maximum" isn't actually a first name. What nice people, I wondered, had made seamless mutants with actual names?

Not nice enough. Really nice people didn't make mutants at all.

"Comfortable?" the frog-woman said. "Terribly sorry about the accommodations. We figured this was the best way to get in touch with you."

"Uh-huh," I said. "Who exactly are you?"

"We're the ICBG," she said grandly. "You may call me Laura. We have a request for you and your flock."

"What might that be?" I retorted. "Let myself be experimented on? Stop my work with the Coalition to Stop the Madness? Die right now because I'm out-of-date? Trust me, any request you have, we've been asked already, and the answer is no."

Laura glowered. "Your wisecracks won't do you any good here. We want your help, Max. The ICBG needs you."

"Right. What's the ICBG?" I asked.

"Oh, it's just a joke name, kind of tongue-in-cheek," she replied. "The International Conglomerate of Bad Guys."

"Okay," I said. "Listen, if you want our help, it had better be a high-quality job, done for the good of the planet and with a salary in the high pastries."

Laura bared her teeth (yes, frogs have teeth) and stomped her foot powerfully. "You don't know the first thing about the betterment of the world!" she bellowed. "We've been working our asses off for our entire adult lives, and they lock us up. You? You didn't even do anything. You're just cute. And the world accepts _you_."

I nodded, fascinated. This was a new one. "You're jealous," I said.

Laura kicked me in the chest, hurling me across the cabin of the plane. "Don't you dare," she snarled.

"Listen, the world doesn't accept us," I said. "Everywhere we go, we're followed by psychos like you. Ever hear of Mr. Chu? Of course you have. You're probably for him, aren't you?"

"Don't call me a psycho," Laura growled.

"Laura," the octopus said, speaking for the first time. "You're not helping their opinion of us."

Fang bolted up to me and helped me to my feet. The octopus oozed up to us.

"Forgive my partner, please," the octopus whined. "My name is Danny Brooks."

"Hi," I said coldly.

"We want your help, Max," Danny said gently. "Please. We're good people, truly. Help us… help us to gain acceptance in this world. All we have to prove ourselves with are our minds… and that's what got us locked up in the first place."

Suddenly, Fang whipped out a gun. Laura jumped at us, but Fang chopped her in the diaphragm and knocked her to the ground with a swift kick to the head, ending by aiming his pistol at her cowering figure.

"Wait!" I said. "Don't kill them, Fang."

There was no time to argue the point, as Fang had been attacked by a neatly camouflaged mutant. A stingray with a 23-foot wingspan, dark blue with white spots, exactly like the carpet of the cabin of the plane. It slithered along the floor as easily as a real ray swims through water. Also of concern, a goat. Shorter than Laura but still bulky and very deadly-looking.

Fang shot the floor, which promptly exploded—way too efficiently for a bullet from a pistol. He must have stuck something fancy in there. The two of us dropped down and began to fly straight back to the Day and Night School.

"We're only going this way to pick up the rest of the flock," I said. "After we do, we're leaving this school."

"No we're not," he said simply.

The disregard of my opinion that seemed to be going around lately was oh so charmingly infuriating. "Where did you get the gun?" I asked.

"Never leave home without it," he replied. "Don't like being interrupted on a date."

Well, that was flattering. I glanced over my shoulder and saw four brightly-colored figures parachuting down… and then the giant seagull, Albert. He didn't appear to be coming our way. We were outta here.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

I whipped out a phone. "Jeb?"

"Hello, Max. This is pleasant."

"Yeah, yeah. Listen, Jeb, what do you know about the International Conglomerate of Bad Guys?"

He laughed. "Are you messing with me?"

"No," I replied. "I don't do petty tit-for-tat. Just because you've been messing with me my entire life, that's no reason for me to mess with you."

"Fine," Jeb sighed. "I've never heard of that group. Where did you hear about them?"

"They kidnapped me," I replied. "Why? There are other ways to meet people? I didn't realize that. Tell me more."

"I'm sorry, Max, I don't know anything about the International Conglomerate of Bad Guys."

I clicked the phone down. "Jeb draw a blank?" Iggy called. He was kicking ass on our dormitory's pinball machine like nobody's business.

"Yeah," I said. "Don't think he was lying… I should have waited to see him in person. I would have been able to judge better."

"Why would you have to judge whether he was lying?" Iggy asked.

"Well, I don't want to have another run-in with these people," I said. "If Jeb has any idea how to keep them away from us… and since nobody's leaving this goddamned school… I gotta do what I gotta do."

Iggy turned casually to me, not moving his hands from the buttons. "Yeah, that is what you gotta do, isn't it?"

He was trying to make eye contact, but wound up staring at my forehead. "I'm seven inches shorter than you," I offered helpfully, not bothering to add that I thought said height difference was insane. His eyes focused to me a bit more accurately. "Sure, that's what I gotta do. What are you implying?"

"Well, it just got me thinking," he said. "It's always about the flock with you, isn't it? That's all you care about. It's all us, us, us. You ever think about what _you_ need? Huh? Do ya?" He paused. "Are you smiling?"

"Should I be?" I said cautiously.

"Well, that was a joke. Kind of. It was a double entendre. You really didn't get that?"

"No, I didn't," I admitted. "Tell me."

Iggy lost his pinball. "Damn," he muttered. "Sorry. Well, what I was saying is that you're completely selfless when it comes to the flock. Don't you ever consider… you know, just looking out for number one?"

"No, I don't," I said. "Number one is nothing without numbers two through six. Without the flock, I'm not _me_."

"Well, I know that," he said earnestly. "I'm just saying, there's a lot of sacrifice on your part. I mean, do you even want to be with Fang?"

I gaped. "Of course I do!"

"Just checking," he said. "It just seemed to me that even if you didn't, you'd be dating him anyway just because _he_ wanted to."

"That's ridiculous," I said.

"Okay, good." He was silent for a moment. "He loves you a lot, you know. He's always been so sure that you've never loved him as much as he does you."

I raised an eyebrow. "Did he tell you that?"

"No, but I pick up a lot more things than people give me credit for," Iggy said. "He doesn't realize that I catch as much of his body language as I do. Really, you should try to explore the depths of your relationship, you know what I mean?"

I snorted. "I don't need tips on bonding with somebody who's already my soulmate, thank you. Especially not from a kid."

"Don't call me a kid," Iggy snapped. "Okay? I'm no younger than you and Fang, and I've been through the exact same shit as you two… and, dare I say it, more." He pointed to his eyes.

"All right, Iggy," I said. "You didn't deserve that remark. I'm sorry."

While I would admit I was sorry, I would not admit that he was right. And he kind of was. The intense trust and love between Fang and myself was beautiful, but I could say the same thing of the other four kids—in words at least. In terms of a romantic relationship, whatever it was between me and Fang was primarily kiss-based.

What more could blossom from this, this truest of true loves? Something important. Something that I could never get from anyone else. Not even another flock member. Definitely not a full human.

Well, that was an easy answer. But it wasn't something I was ready or willing to think about.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

The Big Guy frowned. "They escaped?"

"It won't happen again," Laura snarled. "Trust me on this one. I'll get them, and I'll pluck them like the poultry they are."

"There will be no plucking," the Big Guy interrupted. "Perhaps I was making a mistake. You're good at leading assaults and such, Laura, but I don't think a diplomatic mission should fall to you or the twins. Albert?"

The giant seagull lifted his head gloomily. "Yeah, Big Guy?"

"Do you think that you and Felicia can field this next one?" the Big Guy asked politely.

"Perhaps," Albert said. "We… we really want out of this life, you know."

"We all do," the Big Guy said. "Maximum Ride is our ticket out." The Big Guy dug a sticky claw into the pocket of his jacket, pulling out a photograph of an elderly Hispanic man with long black hair and a white mustache, captioned "Pablo Rodriguez, 2001". "Laura, I apologize for expecting unreasonable things of you," the Big Guy said.

"Give me a break," Laura muttered.

Big Guy turned back to Albert and his companion, a thick brown snake. "Albert, Felicia. Prepare the craft. Try your best, won't you?" The two of them nodded and left. "Jewel, escort Laura to her room."

"I can get to—" Laura began, but the Big Guy had already left to his private quarters.

Jewel chuckled. "Escort Laura to her room," he taunted. Laura's customary sneer was replaced by horror.

The Big Guy didn't approve of punishments. But there was an easy way around that: don't let him find out. Jewel had punished every member of the ICBG multiple times, and they had all reported to the Big Guy, to no avail. The Big Guy would never believe that his precious Jewel could ever be the slightest bit sadistic.

Jewel shot a stream of spider silk into Laura's face, muffling her screams and also her breathing. Jewel then slashed and pounded Laura's back. "You're never going to do it again, are you?" he whispered pleasantly. "Yes, that's right, Laura. Those who make mistakes must be eliminated… I'd hate to do that to you." He paused, listening carefully for the exact moment that Laura's heart stopped beating. When it did, he allowed her to breathe again… she looked up at him, trying hard not to show her hatred. A show of defiance would only get her punished again.

And it would be for nothing, not unless the Big Guy managed to personally witness Jewel's methods of torture. Precious little Jewel could do no wrong.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

A distinctive figure was prancing around the hall, doing a circuit around me.

"Ah, Max!" Keegan breathed. "You ever have a day so perfect, you feel like you could fly?"

"I feel like I can fly every day, regardless of my mood," I said dryly.

"Oh, you know what I mean," Keegan laughed.

"What are you so happy about?" I asked. For some reason I couldn't figure out, I genuinely wanted to know.

"Niles and I are going steady," she said happily. "You know Niles, right?"

"Uh-huh," I said. I hadn't wanted to learn the names of everyone in my class, but it had happened anyway. There weren't very many of them. Niles was a kid who was very, very blond and had broad shoulders. All in all, sorta-kinda cute.

"Niles has been the best boyfriend ever," Keegan said dreamily. "You know what that's like, right? Having the best boyfriend ever?"

"Yeah, I'd say so."

"Oh, I know you do," Keegan said. "Fang. He's flippin' hot, isn't he?"

"So I've heard," I said.

"Niles is the best," Keegan said. "He's so respectful, and he really, really listens."

"Yeah, but in the end it comes down to one thing," I said. "He's a person. Doesn't matter how much you trust a person, you end up regretting it. A person will say they love you, and then they'll sell you for ten grand, or betray you to the bad guys, or just walk out on you…" Keegan stared blankly. "But you know, I'm biased," I said quickly. "I'm sure Niles is super-cool."

"Max!" I heard Nudge yell. She ran over to me. "Oh, Max, Aaron asked me on a date _out of town_! How awesome is that?"

I smiled. "Well, that's really nice, Nudge, but we're still not sure if we can trust this guy."

"But Maaaax," she whined. "He really likes me. He's not a traitor."

"Even if that's the case," I said, "if you were alone with him that would be the perfect opportunity for someone to ambush you. It can't happen, Nudge, I'm sorry."

"Fine," she muttered. "But I still think it's mostly _you_ who the people are interested in."

"Well, maybe they'd think that kidnapping you would be a good way to get to me," I said. "Which would be totally true, by the way. You know you're my best sister, don't you?"

"Yeah," Nudge muttered. "Thanks. You're right. I'll tell Aaron no. So, still haven't found out anything about the ICBG?"

"No, I—"

I paused as I caught something out of the corner of my eye. At the mention of the ICBG, Keegan had gasped and gone pale. I stared at her, burning a hole through her with my laser-focus raptor eyes, daring her to explain what that reaction had been about. She stared back for a few moments, then nervously slipped off. I let her.

Keegan's little move there served as a potent reminder for something that I certainly didn't need to be reminded of…

"Nudge," I said. "You're forbidden to see Aaron ever again. That's an order."

…Trust no one.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

Fang caressed my neck, nuzzling it lightly with his face.

"Hey, Fang," I said. "You wanna hear something weird?"

"Talk to me," he replied. We were on my bed. The flock had its own private dormitory (preferential treatment, anyone?) and we each had our own room. Fang had, quite early on, expressed that he had no interest at all in his room.

Frankly, at this moment, I couldn't give a rat's ass about his room either.

"I… I love you. I truly do, you know that?"

His lips came slowly up my neck until they reached my own mouth. "Why is that weird?"

"Well, you know," I said. "Coming from me."

"No," he countered. "Doesn't matter who it's coming from, or who it's going to, that's the most natural thing a person can say."

"I love you," I said thoughtfully. It seemed so healthy, so rejuvenating, that I had to say it again. And again and again and again. "I love you," I said. "I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you…"

He silenced me with a quick kiss. "And I love you," he said. "I _love_ you, I _want_ you, I _desire_ you…"

Uh-oh. His hand was traveling delicately up my back. I tightened my shoulder muscles, clamping down my wings. "Were you going for my bra?" I hissed.

"I'm sorry," he said. An apology is nice, but it's hard to take it seriously from a guy who is _still_ trying to get his hand in between my wings.

"Fang, I think we should discuss this…" I muttered.

He held my face, his pure black eyes boring into mine. "Discuss?" he said. "What's to discuss? We're never going to want to do this with anyone else. Like you've said, there'll be no more looking. And in our way of life, sooner is always better than later. Unless you'd rather wait for our wedding night…"

"Well, yes, actually," I said. "You know, if we… if we… well, if you think it's a good idea, let's have our 'wedding night' right friggin' now."

I pressed my lips to his tightly. It was true, what he'd said. There was no defying the sheer _logic_ of it. Fang would be my only love. So we may as well see how that would pan out.

Of course, I don't know if logic is the best way to figure out sex. Either way, as I helped him take off his jacket, I saw a much better reason than logic. What was the word he had used? Desire? Hell yeah. I desired him, too.

I slipped my own jacket off, then spread my wings, shredding my flimsy t-shirt.

"This is the greatest thing that could ever happen to people like us," I muttered.

"Yeah?" he replied, barely breathing. His lips were tracing my throat again, while his hands were, as I believe the term is in Sexist-Pig City, rounding second base.

"Yeah," I said. "I mean, I can imagine the rest of the flock… in spite of how happy you make me, I kind of feel bad, like maybe the other kids are jealous that we've… that we've found love within the flock. I can't see that happening to any of the rest of them."

"Oh, don't feel too bad for them," he said. "The flock is a very special thing, but who ever said that everyone's soulmate has to be in the flock? I mean…" He paused for a moment to get in a few reassuring kisses. "Look at Nudge, look at how good she is with Aaron. That could grow into something special as easily as anything else could."

I shifted uneasily. "Well, maybe down the road, when the world is at peace or whatever. But right now… it's just not possible. You know, especially since I've already told the flock, we can't get close to anyone. It just can't happen."

Fang lifted his head, looking into my eyes. "You told them that?"

"Yeah," I muttered. "I told Nudge she couldn't see Aaron anymore. You know, we just need to keep the same perspective we've always had. We… Fang?"

He had stood up, looking down at me with disbelief. "You did that?" he demanded. "No wonder she's been so depressed all day."

"It's for the best," I said.

"No, it's not," he retorted. "I can't believe you! You're really determined to ruin the first good thing that's ever happened to this flock, aren't you? Bad enough that you're trying to escape from this school. I'm going to bed." He turned to leave.

"You're going to bed?" I repeated. "Doesn't look like that's what you've been doing. I thought you were pressuring me into sex. I'm still up for it!"

"Yeah, well, good luck with that," he snapped.

"You don't want to anymore?" I taunted.

He turned to me. His eye twitched noticeably. "Oh, I still want to," he said. "It's a testament to how ticked off I am that I'm leaving now. I mean, this is… sacrifice."

"Right," I sneered. "Sacrifice. Like I don't know exactly what you'll be doing as soon as you get to your room!"

He slammed my door.

_Well, you can't have a relationship without the occasional fight, _somebody in my head said, amused. I didn't know if it was the Voice, or Angel, or just me. And I didn't care. I just muttered to whoever it was to get out of my head, then I went to sleep.


	9. Chapter 9

**I've tried to maintain the tone of the series (having chapters in which Max is not present told in the third person) but I decided that I'd like to try out some other things. Fang, Iggy, and Nudge deserve first-person narratives. And Gazzy and Angel… well, they'll just have to wait their turn and see how it pans out.**

**Chapter 9**

First of all, Max was wrong about knowing what I'd do when I got to my room. I just punched some stuff and then plopped right down into bed. Just, uh… yeah, just thought I'd clear that up.

Max says she'd follow me into an active volcano with no second thoughts. I wish she wouldn't talk that way. It'd be nice to know that she actually places value on my opinion. She knows how much I love her, but I wish she would understand what that entails.

She needs a break. She needs to hang up her hat and coat, stop being the savior of the planet and just be a girl for a while.

I hadn't realized I was sleeping until my blanket was abruptly ripped off. "Hey—"

It was Nudge and Gazzy. "Up and it at, Fang," Nudge said. "Big day today."

"It is?"

"Does there have to be a reason for a day to be a big day?" Nudge said. "Come on, let's go."

"All right," Gazzy said. "Well, what should Fang wear on this most special of days? Let's look through the closet… ah, there's a black shirt, a black coat, and black jeans."

"No, Fang shouldn't wear that," Nudge said quickly. "He should go with something more like… a black shirt, a black coat, and black jeans."

"Well, considering the event," Gazzy said, "perhaps a black shirt, a black coat, and black jeans would be better."

"We don't have to make too much of an event of it," Nudge said. "How about we go with the all-purpose option of a black shirt, a black coat, and black jeans?"

"Just so I'm prepared," I said, "how much longer are you two gonna be doing that?"

They exchanged glances. "Till you laugh," Nudge suggested.

"Get out," I said.

They skedaddled, and I got dressed. A black shirt, a black coat, and black jeans. I wasn't gonna prove Nudge and Gazzy right, but I don't actually own anything else, and Iggy's gotten too big for me to borrow his clothes without looking like a gangster. Contrary to popular belief, I'm not a gangster. More of a punk, really.

I went to the common room. Iggy, as usual, had picked out a favorite chair and rarely left it for fear someone would move it. "Fang's going through this religious thing," Iggy was saying.

"What religious thing?" I demanded.

"Well, I don't really know," Iggy said. "You tell me. What religion is it you're trying to get into? What religion is it that forbids you from making sound when you walk?"

The other kids broke out laughing. "Okay, what's this special occasion that these guys are talking about?" I demanded. "Is it 'Mock-Attributes-of-Fang's-Character' day?"

"You gotta admit, you are a bit mock-able, babe," Max said.

I whirled on her. "Babe?" I said.

"You don't wanna be called babe?"

"No, no, go ahead and call me babe," I said quickly. "I'd enjoy that. I just thought you were still mad at me."

She hurled herself over the couch and embraced me. "Can't stay mad at you," she muttered. "You were right, anyway. You're right about a lot of things. More than I'd care to admit. That's why this is a special day. We're being normal. Nudge is going with Aaron again. And you and I are double-dating with a couple of sweet kids named Keegan and Niles. I've arranged it."

"That's right," Iggy said. "And I'm—oh, wait, I have nobody. Wow, I guess I'll just sit around and _read_ then."

"You're really not mad?" I asked Max.

She rolled a shoulder noncommittally. She was leaning her head on my shoulder, her mouth right in my ear. "Not about what you said," she whispered. "But I'd be happier if I had gotten some of _that_."

"Hey," I hissed. "These kids have ears, you know."

"Iggy and Nudge know what the deal is," Max said. "And Angel, well, if she hasn't figured things out by now she's not much of a telepath."

"And Gazzy?"

"Eh, most things go over his head anyway."

"What?" Gazzy demanded. "What goes over my head?"

"Precisely," Max said. "Anyway, I do want you. Start over tonight?"

"No prob," I said. "As long as you're sure."


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

I had a feeling that before the day was done, I'd be sorry that I asked. But there was no choice at this point. It was an act of desperation.

"Nudge?" I said tentatively.

She turned back to me smugly. She knew what the deal was. "Yes?" she said innocently.

"Before you go with Aaron, could you, uh, help me… get ready?"

"Absolutely, Max. How can I help?"

Evil little creep. She's gonna make me say it aloud? "Nudge, I… I want a makeover."

Nudge giggled maniacally and pulled me up to her room. How she got the room _that _pink in so little time, I'll never figure out. She plopped me down on a chair and made eye contact with me in the mirror.

"Have anything special in mind?" she asked.

"Um… well, I was thinking I could dye my hair."

"Okay," she said. "Maybe accent the sun streaks? Or you could go completely blond. Or! I just had a terrific idea. How about we go really, really blond for the streaks, but the bulk of your hair we could go totally black. That would be hot!"

"Actually," I said. "I was thinking maybe… red. Like, a real dark red."

Nudge raised an eyebrow. "Dark red?" she demanded. "While you're at it, why don't you just shave off your eyebrows and pencil them back in, you Latina-trash? We gotta keep this… you know, _normal_."

"Latina-trash?" I demanded. "Excuse me?"

"Trust me, Max," Nudge said. "I know what's pretty. You wouldn't look good with red hair."

"Fang…" I muttered.

"Hmm?"

"Fang loves redheads," I finished.

Nudge swiveled the chair around and gripped my shoulders. "Fang does not love redheads," she said sternly. "He loves _you_. Okay? Don't compare yourself to girls he's liked in the past. He didn't know any better then. Now he realizes what he has."

How do these kids know all this stuff? Does Fang monologue behind my back or something? Or maybe Angel. That would make more sense.

Nudge tied my hair back and whipped out the makeup.

"Tell me about Aaron," I said to her.

She sighed contentedly. "Oh, he's great. When I'm around him, it's just so easy to smile and laugh and be calm. When we're together… I feel like a _girl_, you know?"

My heart freaking wilted.

"And then…" she was still saying. "Even when I go home, there's no thinking about anything else. I don't stop to think that there's a self-admitted 'International Conglomerate of Bad Guys' after me. I just remember what it's like to be with Aaron, how beautiful it is to talk to him, how insanely good it feels to kiss him…"

"What?" I said, startled. "You've kissed him?"

"Huh? Oh, no, that was… just a guess. And we make out, like, all the time. But mostly just a guess."

I was about to scold her. After all, that's the kind of thing you bring to the attention of your parental figure ahead of time. You'd think I'd have started telling her not to do that anymore, that it wasn't appropriate for someone her age.

Then you remember how I behaved the first eight or nine times that Fang kissed me.

Then you start to cry.

In three days, Nudge had developed a kind of courage that I had lacked for a very long time. Why had I been about to chide her? What she deserved was applause.

Well, I've been in a lot of fights. There's no need for me to elaborate on that. There have been all different kinds of fights. Then there was the torture. The survival. The days spent in sickbeds. But there's nothing I've suffered through that can compare to that makeover.

But the ends justified the means. When Nudge was through with me, I was easily the prettiest bird-girl in the building. That, I suppose, is the main difference between the makeover and getting my face sliced open.

Returning to the common room, there was a familiar little twerp waiting for me.

"Ella!" I said happily. "Hey, I didn't realize you were coming to visit today." I gave her a great big hug, with both arms and wings. The BK hug, as we call it. "Can I catch up with you later? I have a double-date."

"Oh, do you?" Ella said, interested. "Wow, you're really pretty right now."

"Did I do a good job?" Nudge asked.

"Yeah," Ella said. "She's super-beautiful, but you've really kept her ordinary style at the same time."

"I know!" Nudge said excitedly. I prepared myself to zone out, allowing the girly-girls to do whatever it is they do. "I worked really hard. I had to clean her up real carefully, because we still need Fang to want to do her."

"Nudge!" I snarled. I glared at her, hoping that I would develop the ability to shoot lasers out of my eyes within the next few minutes.

"What?" Nudge said. "That's the plan, isn't it? Tonight?"

"You're gonna sleep with him?" Ella said excitedly.

"Listen," I said quickly. "Fang and I aren't role models, okay? I'd better not find out that you're doing anything like this. Either of you."

Ella shrugged. "Don't worry. I don't even have a boyfriend."

"Bye, Max!" Nudge said cheerfully. "Tell Keegan I said hey."

"Right," I muttered. "Keegan." Still haven't figured her out. If she betrayed us tonight… well, then I probably wasn't having sex. Among other things.

"Well, have a great time, Max," Ella said. "Hang out with me tomorrow morning?"

"You betcha," I said.

"Tell me _everything_," she added emphatically.

"Actually, we'll probably be able to hear," Nudge said. "You can stay in my room and I'll get a stethoscope for the wall."

I eyeballed Nudge again. But there was no time to chew her out. Tonight, there were discoveries to be made.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

Aaron interlaced his cool, tan fingers with mine. My already-freaky heart-rate was breaking records.

The two of us were walking around the park together. Hand in hand, just doing a little circle around the pond. An old woman passed by us and smiled. I tried to look at us from an outsider's perspective… yup, we were pretty darn cute.

We didn't say much. Our first conversation had been full of awkward pauses and silences, but from the first moment he held my hand, those moments of silence became the most perfect times of my life.

"Oh, look, Aaron!" I said. "Pelicans!"

Two of the large white birds had settled into the water. "Cool," he said. "Let's get 'em!"

"Get 'em?" I repeated.

Aaron withdrew his hand from mine and dove into the water, tackling one of the pelicans. He had always been strong and fast. And so incredibly funny. Around Aaron, laughter came as often as breathing. I performed a front flip and pounced on the second pelican. The giant bird grappled with me under the water for a few moments before we surfaced. The two pelicans flew away indignantly.

"Look at that," I said. "We're a pretty special couple, aren't we? Most couples exchange cards and flowers… we wrestle pelicans."

Aaron swam up to me and looked me in the eyes. "You're so pretty, Nudge," he said. My heart pounded seventy-two billion times in the next quarter of a second.

"You have big, expressive eyes," Aaron said. "And soft, delicious lips…"

He rubbed my shoulders. The water was still chest-high. "Hmm, Aaron," I sighed. "That feels really good, but I can't fly with wet feathers."

"I'll walk you all the way back," he promised. "And we can dry you off. We have time."

"That's true," I said. "When I'm with you, I feel like I have all the time in the world."

He kissed my neck. It was just so… so _sensual_. I could hardly breathe.

"Nudge?" he said.

"Yeah, Aaron?"

"What are those numbers on the back of your neck?"

"WHAT?" I shrieked. "I can't be expiring! What are the numbers?"

I whirled on him, and saw that he was laughing aloud.

"Were… were you _joking_?" I demanded. "Don't do that, Aaron! That really scared me! It's something I worry about in my life a lot."

"Relax, Nudge," Aaron said. "I was just playing."

"You stop laughing!" I roared. I punched him hard in the face and heaved myself out of the water.

My feathers were still too wet to fly. I ran all the way back to the dormitory, tears streaming down my face, shoving past anybody who got in my way.

The only one in the common room was Iggy. "Nudge?" he said. "What's going on?"

"It's Aaron," I said. "He… he made this totally horrible joke… he pretended that my expiration date had appeared."

"Oh, God," he said, disgusted. "That's bad taste if I ever heard it."

"I know," I muttered. "I was really freaked out, but he wouldn't stop laughing… I don't know what to do, Iggy. I'd never seen that side of him before. I'm so in love with him…" I looked at Iggy hopefully.

"Uh…" he said. "I'm not so good with the wisdom. Could I interest you in sarcasm instead?"

I giggled weakly and sat down on his chair with him. We were skinny enough that we still had a tiny bit of personal space there. "Please, Iggy?" I said. "Any ideas at all?"

He sighed and wrapped an arm around me. "Listen, Nudge. You and Aaron are at a transitional point in your lives, one that Max, Fang, and myself have been enjoying for a while. You've seen the way Max and Fang interact. They're not crazy. They're just being fourteen."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that for another couple of years, there'll be some freaky stuff messing with your brain, and Aaron's too. Things will happen that later you might regret. You've got to let a couple of things slide. Be as forgiving as you can, because if a relationship can survive puberty, it can probably survive just about anything."

I hugged him tightly. "Thanks, Iggy," I said. "Love you."

"Goodnight, Nudge," he said.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

Out to dinner with Fang! We were all dressed up, out at a fancy-schmancy French restaurant. He was being his usual suave and stoic self as we were shown to our table for four.

I put an active effort into looking at the menu instead of, say, his abs. As it turns out, I didn't need that much effort. Haute cuisine _is_ rather enticing. It doesn't outweigh sexual desire, but damn, it comes close.

Keegan and Niles approached. I'd asked Niles about the date, and Niles had been the one who agreed. So, I hadn't seen Keegan since our little awkward moment the day before. I hadn't forgotten about that, and I had every intention of getting to the bottom of it. She grinned sheepishly; apparently she remembered too.

I saw the smile, how sweet and innocent it was, and my suspicions just melted away in an instant. In that moment, I knew… Keegan was my _friend_. There was no intense sisterly bond, but I cared for her. How could I ever have thought that this lovely little girl had ties to the people hunting me?

I remembered all the lies. I remembered all the betrayals.

But coming from Keegan, that just didn't seem possible.

It never occurred to me that such a quick change of stance could be the product of someone messing with my mind. Then again, I suppose that's what mind-tricks do.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Fang carried me into the dormitory, honeymoon-style. I would have commented on that interesting choice, but… the eyes! I couldn't look away. His love for me truly was hypnotic.

"There they are!" I heard Ella say. That grabbed my attention long enough. Ella and Nudge were waiting excitedly at the top of the stairs.

"Will you two buzz off?" I said.

They grinned.

"How was _your_ date?" I challenged Nudge.

"Eh, didn't go too well," she admitted. "But we'll be okay."

"Yeah?" I said. "That's good."

Fang and I passed them. With the moment drawing so near, I found that the knowledge that there were witnesses just sort of… leave. It really seemed like the only things in the world were Fang and me, and that in a moment those two things would be becoming one thing. Nothing else mattered.

"Last chance to back out," Fang said.

"Never," I insisted.

He dropped me on the bed. We kissed for a few minutes, heating up the room in preparation.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

I woke up before Fang did. Laying flat on my back, I looked up at the ceiling, and just thought about _him_. And thought and thought and thought.

There could be no debate about what had happened last night. It wasn't that we had made love, so much as he made love _to_ me. I may be a tough gal, the ultimate warrior queen, but at the end of the day, I'm still a girl. Fang towered over me, he held me tight… and that was how it should have been.

"What are you thinking about?" he whispered.

"Jeff Dunham," I replied.

"What?" he repeated.

"Jeff Dunham. The ventriloquist comedian? You know that guy? He's… he's not funny. Like, at all."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"I'm kidding," I said. I turned to him and kissed him. "Last night was… fabulous. I never want to sleep in a bed without you ever again, Fang."

He hugged me tight. "You won't," he said simply. "Wherever you sleep, I'll be here, on all sides." We kissed heartily.

"You want to go on a picnic or something?" I asked.

"Not now," he said. "We have to go to school."

"Damn it," I muttered. "I… I just want you all the time now. When have we ever been truly alone? It just doesn't happen."

He caressed my face. "We'll get plenty of chances," he said. "We have a lot of life left."

That was debatable. But I knew what he meant.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

Felicia Nguyen gently coiled her snakelike body around the seagull torso of Albert Bach. "Are we doing the right thing?" she whispered. Her voice was deep and somewhat distorted. She had been born deaf.

Albert hesitantly picked up a pad and paper. Their conversations had begun taking on that format more often lately. She preferred him to type, but Jewel was hooked up to all the computers. He would immediately catch it if they were typing anything even vaguely conspiratorial.

_It doesn't matter,_ Albert wrote. _We have no choice anymore. Either the ICBG takes over everything, or we're incarcerated again. Those were always our only options._

Felicia slapped her tail against the floor. "It's not fair," she growled. "We never did anything to deserve getting locked up. We were just smart. That's a crime?"

_That's why we need the flock,_ Albert wrote. _Kindred spirits. If we could only get them to understand, then we'd have a powerful force for good on our side. I truly think they can empathize. Just look at who they are, look at all the love in their eyes when they look at one another. Just like us._

Felicia coiled around him tightly. "I love you, Albert," she said.

Albert hugged her back with his wings, his soft feathers brushing against her dry scales. It was less than gratifying. During their imprisonment, in a government facility designed to hold America's dangerous, unstable geniuses, they had only one task—do as they were told. Design. Calculate. The two of them alone could take credit for a decent portion of the pieces of technology in the world today. But there had been no physical contact allowed. Albert and Felicia's love had been cooked with extreme pressure. And only minutes after their breakout, they had been changed. A bird and a snake could not embrace.

_We are,_ Albert wrote.

"We are what?" Felicia asked.

_We are doing the right thing. This organization consists of good people. I'm sure of it._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Jewel drove his Jet Ski up alongside the research vessel in the Mediterranean Sea. In a single bound, he was on deck. The scientists and crewmen cried out in alarm.

"All right, this is now officially an ICBG vessel!" Jewel bellowed.

He stomped on the deck, sending currents of electricity throughout the ship. Every person in the open air was instantly vaporized—nothing was left of them but fried shoes. Jewel slipped below decks. "Let's take a look at who around here can help us," he said thoughtfully. "Don't need you, don't need you, don't need you…" For every person he met, he cut a throat, or snapped a neck, or bashed in a skull. In no time, there were only two living things on the ship—a pair of young scientists.

"Okay, might need you," Jewel said to one of them. "Hmm… nah." He encased the person in a silken cocoon, which thrashed for a few moments before going limp. The man had suffocated.

"And _you_…" Jewel continued, finally turning his attention to the woman. "Yeah, you I may need."

Brigid Dwyer smiled uneasily. "Well, it's always nice to hear that I'm needed." She looked at the fresh corpses surrounding her.

"Not all that fazed, are you?" Jewel noted.

She shrugged. "I've seen worse."

"Yeah… well, damage control time," he said, slapping his hands together. "Maximum Ride knows where your… _alliances_ are."

"Meaning what?" Brigid said uneasily.

"She saw you with Mr. Chu," Jewel said. "Didn't do anything about it, of course, 'cause she's useless like that… but no matter how little she's worth, she is clever, no doubting that."

"What are you getting at?" Brigid said.

"My name is Jewel," he said. "I represent a group called the International Conglomerate of Bad Guys."

Brigid's eyes sparkled. "You want me to join?"

"No," Jewel said. "You're joining _me_. Once the ICBG overthrows the world, I overthrow the ICBG. I can guarantee that you can survive both. My creator, the Big Guy—he mustn't know about this. Here's a phone, untraceable. Don't make any calls on it; I'll call you. Are you with me on this?"

Brigid surveyed the carnage once again. "Don't have much of a choice, do I?"

"I suppose not," Jewel said, laughing. "Okay. Well, here's what we do. We have to destroy all of the evidence of this, obviously. We sink the boat… they find you floating around like the luckiest bitch alive. For authenticity's sake… you may have to hope you are rather lucky." Jewel shot a hole in the hull of the ship. "If you survive, I'll give you a call," he said. "You could be valuable, Dwyer. You could very well be valuable. I don't really know yet."


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

I hit my head on a low-hanging door.

"They gotta make these doors taller," I grumbled.

"It's nobody's fault," Nudge said. "These places were made for humans, who can see and aren't built like a skinny-ass Sasquatch."

I took a swipe at her with my foot, making perfect contact with the shin, resulting in a satisfying cracking sound.

"Ow," Fang growled.

"Sorry," I said. "Was aiming for Nudge."

"Is that a sunburn?" Total said. "And look at those muscles. You're ripped! Don't you ever get tired of being so damn Swedish all the time?"

"Strangely, no, I don't," I admitted. "What are you doing here, Total? I thought you were staying with Mom." The name slipped out. I wondered if Max would mind. Genetics or not, I always felt that Dr. Martinez's mom-ness was primarily spiritual. I'd have to ask Max about that.

"Just need help with the wedding plans," Total said.

The door banged in suddenly. I felt everyone around me—just Fang, Nudge, and Total—get into battle stance.

"Peace!" a voice said.

I quickly tossed my most readily-available bombs.

"Peace!" the voice screeched over the ka-booming. Soon, the voices were silent.

"Iggy!" Nudge said. "He said peace."

"Oh," I said. I shrugged. "I chose to ignore that. Did I kill them?"

"No," Nudge said. "They're breathing, both of them."

"Okay, good. Sorry about that. Are they conscious?"

"No."

"Let's not let them wake up," Fang said.

"They said peace," Nudge reminded him.

"How many times have we fallen for that one?" Fang snapped. "Kill them."

"They're people, Fang," Nudge said incredulously.

"Like that ever stopped anyone from trying to kill _us_?" Fang retorted.

"No, Fang, look," Nudge said. "They're really, really people."

There was a pause, then Fang said, "Huh."

"I love dangling," I said cheerfully.

"There are pictures in their front pockets," Fang said. "The captions say 2001… Albert Bach and Felicia Nguyen. The people in the photos have the same eyes and these two creatures… their exact eyes."

I tried to envision that. "Sounds freaky," I said.

"It is," Total said. "Giant talking anthropomorphic bird and snake. Is that supposed to be high-quality genetic engineering? 'Cause it's not."

"The annoying talking dog with weird fluffy wings wants to know about high-quality genetic engineering?" I mused.

"I look like a dog," Total said. "I feel like a dog. These guys feel way too human. And that 'annoying' remark was below the belt."

"Fine, don't kill them," Fang said. "Let's keep them guarded, though."

"They said peace," Nudge insisted.

"Tell that to the door," Fang said.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**

Well, those of you who have been keeping up with my "adventures" may have surmised that us bird kids' bodies work faster than those of normal people. We have to eat a lot, we heal quickly, and so on. You know that. But here's something you may not have known: my period comes every eight days. And I get a rampaging devil's case of PMS.

God bless Fang. He never says anything about it. Yet another reason for girls across the country to wish he was their boyfriend. Well, those girls can suck it. Ha-ha-ha!

I'm not usually this smug and cruel. Again, every eight days.

I bring this up to explain the hole in the restroom wall shaped like a bird-girl's fist. If I didn't find somebody to beat up soon, I would have to inflict pain onto _myself_. I hadn't gone this long without violence since Colorado; I never realized how much I needed it. I had never made the connection between that and why I used to kick Iggy's ass every week.

Anyway, it's not fun. Okay? Have we established that? Thanks.

"I'm not sure what to do, Max," Nudge was muttering.

"'Bout what?" I asked.

"About Aaron!" Nudge said. "I… I don't know if I love him anymore."

"That's too bad," I said absently.

"I mean it!" Nudge groaned. "He's not very nice to me. He doesn't want me to be away from him. It's like I'm a possession to him."

"You want me to kill him?" I said eagerly. "'Cause I can do that."

"No, no, don't kill him. I just need to know that he loves me. Iggy says I should let some things slide."

I snorted. "Iggy. Right. Everything Iggy knows, he learned from watching _Friends_. Listening to it, I should say. Let me tell you a little something, Nudge: on TV, people don't date. They just have sex. In real life, there's dating."

"Didn't you and Fang have sex?"

"What are you implying?" I demanded, bristling. "You think this shouldn't happen anymore, just because of one night? It doesn't happen every time, you know. And this has nothing to do with what day it is. You think I'm being irritable? You're putting the blame everywhere but on yourself. Maybe you're just irritating."

"Uh-huh," Nudge said. "So, should I give you some space?"

"No, I don't need space. You talk to me, little sister! It's a normal day for a normal conversation."

"No, that's okay," she said. "I'll tell Gazzy it's a bad time to be asking if he can have a pet."


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

Fang and I exchanged a few kung fu blows. It's always good to keep in shape. After three days, the two ICBG dudes were still knocked out and kept under guard. We hadn't told anybody about them.

"You know what's been going on with Nudge?" Fang asked me.

"She's been having some trouble with Aaron, apparently," I said. "I don't really know what it's about."

I threw a kick, and he deflected it with a wing. "Ooh, clever," I said.

"Improvised it," he said. "Might as well use the wings for something."

"Nice move, babe."

I lifted both of my feet and kicked him in the chin six times before I landed back on the ground. He chopped me in the shoulders, actually managing to bring me to my knees for a single second, but I quickly got my fists up into his gut.

"Nice recovery," he complimented. "Have you noticed Iggy moping around lately?"

"Little bit," I said, deflecting a few of his attacks. "What's wrong with him?"

I gave him a double punch, and he did a back flip to get out of my reach. "Well, you know he's always wanted a girlfriend," he said. "I think everything going on with Nudge is kind of depressing him."

He grabbed my foot as it flew forward and hurled me to the ground. "But things aren't going well with Nudge," I said, getting to my feet.

"And I think, in his own 'Iggy' sort of way, that upsets him even more," Fang said.

He spun a 360, getting in six perfectly landed blows: wing, fist, foot, foot, fist, wing. Just like that! In response, I leapt out in desperation, biting Fang hard on the nose.

"Ow!" he roared. "Oh, you crazy bitch… Damn, you fight dirty."

"Then how come my conscience is so clean?" I taunted. "You know who used to fight fair? A lot of dead people."

Another kick tore his feet out from underneath him, a second launched him into the air, and a third from above knocked him flat on the ground. I held his head to the ground with my hands.

"Defeated," I whispered in his ear.

"Not yet," he countered. He rolled over to face me and kissed me lightly.

"Oh, no," I said. "You're not taking the victory that easy…"

He wrapped his arms around me, his lips gently brushing mine. I tried to resist, but he had me by the neck and pulled me in closer.

"Are we having sex again?" I asked.

"That's your call," he replied breathlessly.

"I wanna," I said.

Before I knew what was happening… it was happening. On my bed. There he was, all over me, all around me… can I add the third thing in a T-rated story? It seems like for rhythm's sake there should be three… never mind.

Anyway, we were doing it. It was beautiful and exciting and fantabulous… and it was over way too fast. Don't tell him I said that, though. The top priority is that it was amazing.

"I love you," I whispered.

"I've never deserved you," he replied.

"That's ridiculous," I said. "You're superior to me in every way."

"Well, I did win the fight," he said thoughtfully.

"Yeah, I want a rematch tomorrow," I told him. "This time no sex."

"I'm not sure I can agree with that," he admitted.

"And you say _I_ fight dirty," I grumbled.

"How many dead people once said the same?" he said ominously.

"Just shut up and make love to me again."

"'Kay."


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

"I'm glad we're alone," Aaron said. "Doesn't happen very often."

"Yeah," Nudge replied uneasily. "Cool. Glad we're alone."

"Can we take advantage of that?" Aaron asked.

"Yeah, okay," she murmured.

Now, you're probably thinking, if they're alone, who's hearing all this? Well, that would be me, Iggy, in a tree from which I was stalking them.

Stuff was going on. Nudge continued to insist that she was in love with Aaron, but the spring had left her step. I thought maybe if I spied on her I could figure out exactly what was going on.

Nudge shrieked. "Aaron, don't tickle me."

Don't panic, I thought. No reason to freak out yet. Doesn't mean anything.

"Aaron, I really don't like being tickled," Nudge muttered through her laughter. "I don't like it AT ALL. Stop it now, Aaron!"

I had heard that tickling could lead to something more. And Nudge seemed to be getting upset… but if she was okay, she'd never forgive me for spying on her date.

"Aaron, now that's not even tickling," Nudge said frantically. "You're hurting me! Aaron, stop it! STOP!"

That was it. In the remote event that Nudge would be angry at me, it would be totally worth it. I dove on them and lifted Aaron up over my head by the throat.

"Hey, dude," I said. "When a lady says stop, you stop."

"Iggy!" Nudge said, and I knew immediately that I was doing the right thing. All the relief and affection she managed to slip into the mention of my name was phenomenal.

I dropped Aaron to the ground, and I heard Nudge kick him. "I don't ever want to see you again, you creep!" she snarled.

Nudge and I flew back to school. It was an hour on the wing. We didn't stop to think about how Aaron would get back to his own dorm. I'm sure somebody will find him.

We landed on the roof. "Thank you, Iggy," Nudge said.

"Ah, I didn't do anything special," I said, shrugging.

"No, you did," Nudge said. "This was more than just stopping him from tickling me. I… I would follow your advice to the ends of the earth, Iggy. You know that? And you said that I should let some things slide, and if you hadn't jumped out, I would have thought that him touching me and tickling me was just another one of those things to let slide. But you did! You did jump out. And you protected me… you know, that's what we always should have done. Protecting each other. We're family, aren't we? I don't know. I'm no good with words."

"No, you did just fine," I assured her. "Thanks, Nudge. I never thought of myself as honorable."

"You are," she said. "You're very honorable, Iggy. I love you."

I smiled. "Thanks, Nudge." I paused. "Good night."

I turned to take the stairs down to the dormitory. She grabbed me, spun me back around and hoisted herself up to my face, kissing me intensely. Her lips were soft and warm, and they tasted sweet, like a paper-thin sprinkling of the most delicious fruit candy. For five minutes, she kissed me, and I didn't respond at all. I didn't reject the kiss—wouldn't have dreamed of it. But I didn't kiss her back either. I just stood there for five whole minutes and let her do all the kissing by herself.

I can't be sure, but I would guess that no one could ever have come up with a better way to kiss Nudge.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**

"Thanks for coming, Mom," I said, hugging her tightly. "Where did you put the ICBG thugs?"

"They're well guarded," Mom replied. "These two men are professionals."

The two guys were heavily muscled and had a distinct Mafia feel to them. One of them was thin and had shoulder-length hair the exact same color as his skin; the other was shorter and bulkier with spiky blonde hair.

"Balthasar Greene," the thin man said. "And my brother, Mattie."

"The best bodyguards that Toledo has to offer," Mom said. "They're well-trained in the use of many kinds of guns. They thought they were something pretty cool back in the 1960's. They were wrong, but that's beside the point."

"Ohioans and snipers and squares, oh my," Nudge said. She giggled loudly. "I just pulled that out of my own head!"

"Better put it back before somebody steps on it," Iggy retorted.

Iggy had never been nice to Nudge, and in the two weeks since the whole Aaron fiasco that hadn't really changed all that much. The difference was, now his insults were said in a sweet, mushy voice. On paper, it sounds sweet, but actually it was friggin' weird.

I remember asking them, "So, are you two… together, then?"

"I don't really know," Nudge had admitted. "We were up on the roof, and it just sort of… happened."

At the time, Iggy had been nibbling on her ear, making the "modesty" cover a bit thin. Apparently, every couple works differently. While Fang and I are the "holding hands on the beach" type, Nudge and Iggy have proven to have more of a "can't keep their hands off one another" style.

"This is completely unexpected," I had muttered. "What… what brought this on? You beat up Aaron, you left him alone, and… then what?"

"Then I… I thanked him," Nudge said sweetly, gazing deeply into the blue eyes that could not look back. "I realized just how much I love him… and how much we need each other… and how so, so beautiful he is…"

Iggy tongued her, and I had to turn away to collect my thoughts. Iggy and Nudge! It was inconceivable. I just couldn't wrap my brain around it.

Now, two weeks later, it was slightly more conceivable, but still gross. Nudge was a hormonal little twerp who insisted she was deeply in love with Iggy, which was exactly what she'd said about Aaron. And Iggy was… well, Iggy was Iggy. Together, there was no less-chaste couple in the entire D&N school.

Of course, Fang and I have sex every morning and every evening. And occasionally in the middle of the day. So I suppose I'm not one to talk. But we do that in privacy. They actually started making out in class once. What do you do with hooligans like that?

Although evidently they never go past first base. Iggy possesses a kind of mutant self-control. Like that'll ever do him any good. He's kind of been losing out in the special abilities department. He's gotta get himself some high-speed or… I don't know, fins or something.

Anyway. Balthasar and Mattie let us in. Albert Bach and Felicia Nguyen were tied to hospital beds.

"Get out, Maximum Ride," Albert rasped.

"Why?" I challenged.

"When we woke up, our brains automatically sent transmissions back to base," Albert said. "Our comrades will come to rescue us. They're not like us. You remember Laura? She's stone-cold evil. The twins, Ray and Ram, they're young, their consciences don't bruise. And Jewel, the robot… completely sadistic. He'll kill you all. Very, very painfully."

"We've dealt with robots before," I said.

"Not like Jewel," Albert said. "You've never met anything like Jewel. Jewel is like no piece of technology that ever existed. You have to understand—Felicia and I, we don't want this. We want out of this… this existence. But we're completely alone in that regard. The others… they love this. The ICBG wants to take over the world. They have the know-how. They have the means. And their plan _has no flaws_. Run, Maximum Ride. Or fly. Fly away. You can't win."

Fang and I exchanged glances just as a loud explosion sounded. An insect-like, diamond-studded robot stepped grandly through the door.

"Good to see you," the robot said—in a clear, perfectly human voice. "When Bach and Nguyen disappeared, I thought maybe they had eloped. Good to see that you're still on the team."

"This'll be fun," Fang muttered.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**

"Maximum Ride," Jewel said cheerfully, deliberately emphasizing the way he pronounced my name correctly. Evidently he knew about the Ari-bot. What else did he know? His expression—an expression made with diamond-eyes and pearly-white mandibles—was smug. He knew _a lot_ about me.

"You can't fight him," Albert said. "Fly. Immediately."

The tips of Jewel's fingers crackled with electricity. I needed no more convincing. "Mom, grab on," I said.

Fang and I worked together to lift Mom up and through the ceiling, just as a flamethrower shot out of Jewel's mouth. Balthasar and Mattie took to Jewel with machine guns. Jewel whipped out a jet pack and lifted off into the air after us.

"Max, we can't escape him while we're carrying your mom," Fang said anxiously.

"Can you handle her alone?" I demanded.

"Gonna have to," he said. By our Lord and Savior, I friggin' love that dude.

"Good luck, Max," Mom said. "Balthasar and Mattie are standing by."

Fang took off with Mom, taking her behind the wall. I faced Jewel.

"What exactly does the ICBG want from us?" I asked. "I thought they wanted our help."

"_They_ do," Jewel said. "The ICBG does. Not me." He paused and cocked his head. "Gotta go," he said. "Catch ya later. Laura will bring you in." He vanished in a puff of smoke… it was like magic.

I dropped to the ground. Laura was lifting Felicia and Albert.

"Laura, don't do this," Albert was saying. "The flock, this school, the CSM… they can give us safe haven."

"I don't want safe haven," Laura sneered. "I want to rule the world."

I kicked Laura in the back of the head before landing. She whirled and fired her laser weapon. I dodged and got in a few more good kicks, finally managing to disarm her and aim the gun at her from high above.

"All right, Laura," I said. "You're gonna get out of here. You're not gonna bother the flock anymore."

"What are you doing, a Jedi mind trick?" Laura sneered.

"No, but Angel can," I said. "I can call her over here. I may or may not shoot you. But Angel can make you wish you'd been shot."

"Oh, give me a break," Laura said. She drew another laser, this one handheld. "I'll give you a warning shot," she said. "Then you'd better get down here and surrender or I'll shoot you for real." The beam shot across my belly. I cried out in pain, then rage. I picked Laura up and threw her as far as I could—which was surprisingly far.

I gripped the back of her head. "You're going to die now, Laura," I hissed. "How does that make you feel?"

"Why is my life less valuable than yours?" Laura countered. "We're sisters, you and I. We're the same."

"Yeah?" I said. "Well, that makes you my fourth-favorite sister. Not the highest honor I can bestow."

"You're not a murderer," Laura said. "I know you're not, Maximum Ride. You're a good person. I'm at your mercy. You have no need to kill me."

I flipped Laura over to face me. "You're right," I said. "You're right. I know who I am. And I know who you are. We're people… or we could have been. Yeah. I identify with you completely." I lifted my shirt, showing her the clean wound across my belly… my smooth, lightly rounded belly.

"But you shot at my baby," I said. "And I can't forgive that. Wherever it is you're going, Laura… I hope you find what you're looking for. 'Cause this world isn't for you anymore."

I pulled the trigger.


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**

The Big Guy scratched his bony head with his claws. "I don't know what to do," he muttered. "Laura dead… Albert and Felicia rogue." For consolation, he looked again at the photo of Pablo Rodriguez. The only person who could comfort him now… gone forever.

"Actually, they were rogue before," Danny offered dryly. "The ICBG are rogues. Albert and Felicia are under the care of the government now."

"Show the Big Guy more respect, Brooks," Jewel said sweetly—a tone that usually meant the person being addressed was about to be flogged. "He's trying his best, don't you know."

The Janicke twins flanked the Big Guy. Ray and Ram, barely twelve years old, had been born Noah and Laren, but had changed their names after the experiment. Noah became a giant stingray, Laren a mountain goat—hence, Ray and Ram. The two of them served as the Big Guy's personal bodyguards… but they knew the sting of Jewel's whip as well as anyone else, and shuffled uneasily as Jewel stared Danny down.

"Did anything good come out of this whole thing?" the Big Guy wondered.

"Max is pregnant, apparently," Ray supplied. "If I overheard right."

"Interesting," Jewel said, his eyes sparkling. "We can totally use that."

"What do you mean?" the Big Guy asked.

"Uh… I don't know," Jewel lied. "I was hoping you would."

"I'll work on that," the Big Guy said. "I'll be in my room."

The Big Guy departed. Jewel smirked at Danny. "I don't have time to beat you just yet, Brooks," Jewel said. "I have things to do."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Jewel tunneled through the earth, finally smashing through eight feet of solid steel.

"Hey, Mr. Chu," Jewel said. "I rike the underground rair."

Mr. Chu bristled. "You'll find I don't appreciate your mockery, Jewel."

Chu was flanked by a number of M-Geeks as well as a few human guards. A single person was groveling at his feet, and had glanced up upon Jewel's rather noisy arrival.

"What did I tell you, Hwa?" Chu demanded.

"Do exactly what you say," the woman muttered.

"I did not tell you to lift your eyes," Chu snarled.

"Of course, Mr. Chu, I only—"

Two of Chu's guards instantly leapt upon Hwa and dragged her away.

"Was that for my benefit?" Jewel said. "That's kind of silly, Mr. Chu. You want disregard for human life, try this."

Mr. Chu suddenly found himself encased in a steel dome. He feared that Jewel had killed him, as he had always known the robot would. But after a second, the dome was lifted. The entire room was covered in ash; Jewel was the only thing in the room unharmed, apart from the dome he had placed over Chu. Chu's bodyguards were nowhere to be seen—doubtless, they were nothing but random atoms floating around the room, if that.

"I think I came out on top in that test of intimidation," Jewel said.

"Quite," Chu said shakily. "Dr. Dwyer has told me of your mission, Jewel."

Jewel walked up to Mr. Chu dramatically. "Yes. See, I don't like evil corporations anymore than the CSM does. But for the time being, I recognize your value as an individual."

"Well, that's good to hear," Chu said.

"Your guards, stationed all around the room in little secret cubbies?" Jewel said. "Your throat would be cut before the sound of the gunfire reached us. Then your company would work for me, and you'd be dead. So you might as well give me the company whilst you're alive."

Mr. Chu rubbed his throat. A tiny flap of skin had been cut there. He hadn't even seen Jewel twitch. "Agreed," Chu said. "So, we join forces then? Chu Corporation and the ICBG?"

"No ICBG," Jewel said. "They want the flock's alliance, you see. You and I would rather see them dead."

"Right, then. Chu Corporation and Jewel."

"Wrong again," Jewel said. "Jewel. Just Jewel."


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

I was a murderer. All in all, Laura had been right. She was defenseless and at my mercy, and I could have spared her. But I didn't. I couldn't have.

I had always considered myself maternal, but there was always something there… some part of me that knew that I had no right to call myself the flock's mother. But in this case, I had every right. For I was the mother. This baby was mine, and Fang's. And I would carry it to term, give birth to it. And with that came a kind of power.

Would I kill a defenseless person? What if it was a person who had threatened the flock, perhaps caused harm to them already? Maybe. I don't know.

What if the person had looked at my baby in a weird way? Then, absolutely. I absolutely would kill them.

"Is this amazing or what?" Fang said. His voice was filled with a sort of wonder that I'd never heard before. "3-D ultrasound. Phenomenal."

"That's right," Mom said. "And… here's the baby's face."

Fang gripped my hand tightly. "Would you look at that?" he whispered. "Looks just like you, Max."

"Good," I said, "because your ugly mug doesn't belong on a baby."

In any other situation, Fang would have slapped me, or thrown me the finger. But he never took his eyes off the ultrasound screen.

Mom adjusted the sensor on my belly. I don't know what a vet wants with a 3-D ultrasound. Not a lot of walruses and cattle who want to know exactly what their baby looks like. You'd think the normal way would do.

"There's a heartbeat," Mom said. "Look, you can see the heartbeat clear through its chest…"

"Wow," Fang said.

"And keep going down… we have a girl."

"A girl?" Fang demanded. To my shock and alarm, Fang's face was suddenly flowing with tears. "Max, we're having a girl."

"Great," I said, wanting to comfort him but not really knowing how. "Mom, let's just cut to the chase. Let's see what's on the baby's back."

Mom moved the sensor. "Wings," she said.

"Right," I murmured. "I don't really know what else I was expecting there. Of course she has wings…"

"Do you know the due date, Dr. Martinez?" Fang asked.

"I'm not really sure," she admitted. "Mathematically speaking, I think that Max's pregnancy will last just a bit over two and a half months. At two weeks in, that's another 58 days."

Her tone cut into me, and I winced. "I'm sorry, Mom," I said. "I know you're disappointed."

"It's fine, Max," she assured me. "I understand completely."

"Wait," Fang said. "If the baby only grows for two months, then won't it grow up, like, super-fast?"

"No," Mom said hurriedly. "No need to worry about that, Fang. I think that after the baby is born, she'll grow the same as the rest of you… only slightly accelerated, always looking only slightly older than she is."

"Are you sure?" Fang said anxiously.

"I'm _not_ sure. No one like you, no recombinant human being, has ever gotten pregnant before… but I think the wings are a giveaway that she'll be exactly like you."

Fang gripped my hand. "Well, that's the best thing we can ask of a child, isn't it? To be exactly like you."

I shut my eyes. "Thanks, Fang," I muttered. "Thanks a lot."

I stood up and stormed out of there. I didn't need his compliments.


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

I knocked on Nudge's door. "Are you in there, Nudge, my darling?" I called.

She giggled. "Yeah, Iggy, sweetie. Hold on a second. I don't have any clothes on."

"I don't have any eyes on," I retorted.

"Fine," she said. "Come on in, but don't touch me."

The door opened and I slipped in. "What's to touch, exactly?" I said suspiciously.

"Actually, for an eleven-year-old I have a very womanly figure. It's a hassle, really."

"Yeah, that must suck," I said sarcastically. "Fang wanted me to give you Max's ultrasound pictures. That is what these are, right? I had to take his word for it."

"Oh, my," she said, taking them. "Oh, look at their beautiful baby. And it's a girl… oh, Iggy. Oh, Iggy, this is amazing. If you never wished you could see before, wish for it now."

"Right," I grumbled. "I've never wished I could see before."

"Sorry," she muttered. "That was… that was a mean thing to say. I shouldn't have."

"Don't worry about it. Hey, apparently when Fang found out it was a girl, check this out—he cried."

"What?!" she shrieked. "Damn! I want to see stuff like that."

"I know!" I said, smiling. "I always hear about Fang crying, but I'm never _there_ for it. It's unfair, is what it is. After being Fang's best dude for all these years, I deserve to see him cry, damn it. 'Course, I can't ever actually _see_ him cry."

"Iggy, lay off on the blind jokes," she said. "It's not your fault."

"Well, it's not my fault I'm Swedish either, but people make fun of me for that plenty."

"I don't really know what Total meant by that," she admitted. "But… really, you have to stop being mad at yourself for being blind." She took my hand. I laced my fingers into hers.

"I'm just saying, it really makes me feel like a fool," I said. "Always having to be the _one_ member of the flock who needs extra directions, extra help."

"But in the end, it's a good thing," Nudge insisted. "I was reading a magazine earlier this week, and there was this thing about… men. You know."

"Men?" I said. I had never heard that term applied to myself.

"Yeah," Nudge said eagerly. "Men. The magazine said that men are very visual people, and that it's hard for them to look beyond the skin when they're in a relationship. And… that's why it's so wonderful to date a blind man. Because you don't focus on my looks. You can truly listen to me."

"I think everyone truly listens to you, Nudge," I said dryly.

"Well, especially you," she said. "And you really depend on what you hear… and feel… and taste…" Her lips were suddenly on mine.

She was right. It was true. I could hear her, feel her, taste her. It was incredible. I could never have had this kind of sensation if I hadn't lost my sight.

Nudge took me by the wrist and guided my hand to her chest. Specifically, her breasts. Yup, she had 'em. She had been truthful again—she had a striking figure. She still hadn't gotten dressed.

"Oh, wow," I said. "Oh, wow. Oh, wow."

"I love you, Iggy," she said. "Like I've never loved anyone else before."

"Hmm."

"Am I a good girlfriend?" she asked.

"Ah, I don't know about that," I teased. "You're pretty much just a twerp… A freakishly curvy twerp."

"Iggy, I mean it," she said in a hurt tone. "I'm in love with you."

"That's what you said about Aaron."

"I was wrong," she said. "Me and Aaron… that was hellish, it really was. But if that had never happened, I probably never would have realized that I had feelings for you… and that's just a great day for everybody."

I kissed her gently. "I love you, Nudge. You are my girl, never doubt that. Well… I'll talk to you tomorrow."


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

I found Max in the canyon. It was our favorite place, for no reason other than that it was there. We'd fly between the canyon walls, we'd wade in the river, we'd make love in the soft sand. It was the greatest place in the world.

I sank gently to the ground, then sat next to her, saying nothing. I waited for Max to say what was on her mind. It took nearly an hour.

"We're just like them," she said.

"Who?" I asked.

"_Them_," she said. "Jeb. Marian Janssen. The whitecoats. Itex. We're just like them. We're stealing the opportunity for a baby to be born _human_."

"No," I said. "No, that's not true. We conceived this baby because we're in love. And hey—no expiration date on her. She'll outlive us big-time."

"Then what?" she asked. "Alone in the world, the second-generation bird-kid? That's just cruel."

"No," I insisted. "She'll grow up just fine. Okay? I don't know about you, but I love her already."

Max rubbed her own belly. "Yeah, I do," she said. "I love her. You're right, Fang. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, baby."

"You think we should get married, Max?" I asked—abruptly and fearlessly, of course. Actually, I had been obsessing over how I would ask that question for months, but she didn't know that.

She chuckled. "I think we ought to have stopped worrying about doing things the acceptable way after the first stolen car."

"Well, it's not just that," I said. "I want to. Do you want to?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. I don't want to put it on paper."

"I can understand that," I admitted. "Well… remember Keegan and Niles?"

"Of course I do. They're the greatest kids."

"I was thinking, that really sweet way that they commit to one another," I said. "Just a little green plastic ring, probably got it out of a piñata. Worthless, but it signifies the entire relationship. Maybe we could do something like that."

"You have a ring?"

"Sure do," I said. I held it out to her. It was black and featureless. The box, also black and featureless, was probably worth more than the ring.

"I don't think I can accept this, Fang."

"It was three dollars at the freaking zoo, just take it," I said irritably.

"Okay," she said. "Thank you, Fang. I love you."

"Put it on," I said.

She slipped it onto her finger, and it promptly turned powder-blue. "Oh!" she said.

"Mood ring," I said smugly.

"You're the best," Max whispered. "Thank you. I love it."

Angel dropped in from the sky to greet us. "Hi!" she said.

"Hi, Angel," Max said.

"I can hear the baby," she said. "She's warm and happy. She's growing fast. She can hear Fang's voice."

"That's pretty special," Max muttered.

"Well, she's a special baby," Angel said. "What are you gonna name her?"

Max looked to me, and I shrugged. "It's your call," I said.

"Well, I'll need to think about it," she admitted.

"Oh, by the way, we're under attack," Angel said.

"What?!" Max screeched. "That should have been the first thing you said, ya freak! Who gives a damn about the baby and Fang's voice and… ugh! I swear, Angel, you piss me off sometimes."

By the time Max had finished her rant, the three of us were on the wing back to our dorms.


	24. Chapter 24

**I put off updating for a little while for two reasons. First, I admittedly wasn't entirely sure about what happens next. Second, I wasn't sure if it would be a breach of etiquette to go outright and ask for more and bigger reviews. Eventually I figured out what happens next, and… to hell with it. I want more and bigger reviews, so please deliver. You know, just go back through each chapter and sort of type a stream-of-consciousness about what you were thinking whilst reading it. That would be the best, actually. And hey, I know for a fact that I'm not the only person who's irritated to death when every single review is about the very last thing that happened in the story. Tell me what you thought about the whole thing, each event individually.**

**You know, I just care very deeply for the flock and want to know that I do them justice. So, yeah, if I could get a few more reviews, that would be much appreciated.**

**And, yes. This means you.**

**Chapter 24**

"Who's attacking?" Max asked. "Is it ICBG or Mr. Chu?"

"Not sure," Angel said. "Could be either. There are bots swarming the dorm."

"I thought we were protected here," Max grumbled as they landed on the ground. The other three members of the flock were back-to-back on the dormitory roof, preparing to fend off a wave of M-Geeks.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

A mere foot away, Ray turned to grin at the Big Guy. "Isn't this exciting?" he said. "At this moment, no one in the universe knows where we are."

"Yes, boys," the Big Guy said. "Quite an impressive development. Tell me again how it works."

"Put as simply as possible, our bodies are shifting rapidly between our own three-dimensional world and another," Ray explained. "We can observe what's going on, but we are completely undetectable… by anything."

"There was something interesting we wanted to show you," Ram added. "We hadn't anticipated that they would be attacked, but I figure, you know, it's just a bunch of dumb-bots. No one's getting hurt, and it's as good a way to observe them as any."

"You're sure the flock will survive this assault?" the Big Guy said nervously.

"Absolutely," Ram said sincerely. "They're tough cookies, Big Guy. If they can be defeated, it's not by Mr. Chu."

"Good," the Big Guy muttered. "Good to know. So, what was it you wanted to show me?"

Ray smiled broadly. "So glad you asked. You see, in this dimension, the fourth or fifth or whatever it may be, power is a highly tangible thing. If you let your eyes unfocus just a little bit, you can see the power of an individual as gradations of light… let's start with Max. Look at her, but don't _really_ look at her. Let your attention drift a tiny bit."

The Big Guy tried to follow those directions, looking past Max a bit as she fought Mr. Chu's M-Geeks. "It's sort of like she's glowing," he observed. "A sort of yellowish-red, around the edges."

"Right," Ray said. "She possesses a moderate amount of power—the Voice, her high-speed, her underwater breathing. Fang's glow is slightly less prominent—he's also able to breathe underwater, and he's got his camouflage ability as well."

"So with this vision, we can learn the powers of the flock," the Big Guy said eagerly. "I understand."

"Not just yet you don't," Ram said cheerfully. "These are just examples."

"Examples?" the Big Guy said. "I thought we were here to learn about the flock."

"The flock are small potatoes, Big Guy," Ram said. "Wait for it. Now, if we look over here to Iggy and Nudge, their glow is purely red. As a couple, they're not as gifted. Iggy's powers have mostly to do with overcoming his blindness, while Nudge's appear to be allocated randomly. Gazzy, about the same level as Fang and Max."

"Then you'll see Angel," Ray added. "A faint blue-green. She's got powers out the wazoo. Now, one may think that this makes Angel the most powerful being here. Not so."

"No?" the Big Guy said.

"No," Ray said.

At this point, the fight had finished. The flock cleared away the remains of the broken machines, occasionally walking straight through Ray, Ram, or the Big Guy, completely unaware of it.

"For the sake of experimentation, let's take a look at a couple of normal human-types," Ray said. "Here, we'll see Max's mother and little sister. Take a look."

The Big Guy did. "Nothing," he said.

"Precisely. No powers. Just plain old humans. Now, here are their school buddies. Here's Niles…"

"Also without power," the Big Guy said, nodding.

"And Keegan," Ray finished grandly.

"Holy guacamole," the Big Guy whispered.

"Knew you'd be impressed," Ram said smugly.

When the Big Guy looked at Keegan, her silhouette was overtaken by a blinding explosion of pure white. "She… she literally radiates with pure energy," the Big Guy said, awestruck. "What is she?"

"As far as we know, she's just a human," Ray said. "Born a human, grew up a human, no fringes or frills."'

"But… but then what does she do?" the Big Guy wondered. "What could a person do with that level of power?"

"Absolutely anything," Ram said. "She can change people. Make them completely change their minds about their goals. She can bend and shape the elements as she chooses. She can make people feel regret and sorrow about things they'd otherwise never think twice about. If she wished for the entire galaxy to vanish in a ball of fire… it'd happen. And she knows about these powers."

"My God," the Big Guy breathed.

"You see now what we've been saying," Ram said. "The flock are small potatoes. The big cheese here is Keegan."

Ray beamed. "We get Keegan on our side, we won't need the flock. We get her on our side, we're never answering to anyone again… except maybe her, but that's a small price to pay."

The Big Guy frowned. "But she's Max's friend. We can't just get her on our side without Max."

"Max _thinks_ that Keegan is her friend," Ray corrected. "And I can guarantee you that if Max thinks that, then that's exactly what Keegan wants her to think. No more, no less."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Are you guys okay?" Keegan demanded. "Did they hurt you?"

"We came as soon as we heard," Niles added. "If there is anything we can do to help…"

"Don't worry about it, you guys," Max said. "We can take care of ourselves."

"What about the baby?" Keegan urged.

Max turned uncertainly to Angel. "The baby's fine," Angel said smoothly. "Shaken, but not hurt in any way."

"Good," Max said. She turned back to Niles and Keegan. "You two want to double tonight?"

Keegan smiled brightly. "Yes, Max. I'd love to go out with you guys again."


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**

"Iggy!" Nudge said happily, leaping into my arms as I walked down the school hallway.

"Hey," I said. "What's up?"

"Where should we go for our date?" she asked.

She hadn't stopped bugging me about that. "I don't know," I said. "Can't we just make out on the roof again and call that a date?"

"Iggy," she scolded. "Come on, I want a real date. What's something you've always wanted to do?"

"Paintball," I said instantly.

"Paintball?" she demanded.

"Yeah. I've never done that."

"You're blind, Iggy."

"You don't think I can shoot a paintball gun? I have bitchin' aim, Nudge. Remember the time I shot Fang clear out of the sky? That was awesome."

"Fine, fine. But I don't think we should go to paintball for our first date, Iggy."

"Well, then how about the restaurant downtown?" I suggested. "It's got a very chic, sort of '60s style."

"Ooh, I like that."

"And if you finish their Mega-Burger in less than an hour, you don't have to pay for it."

"That's romantic," she said sarcastically. "You don't even like burgers."

"Well, it's the prestige more than anything," I said earnestly. "You get your photo on the wall. I like to think of myself as something of a low-level performance artist."

"Iggy, this is special," Nudge whined. "Our first date should be… you know, extravagant."

"I… I don't know if that's really true," I admitted. "I mean, I love to kiss you and hold you, and I've known you for as long as I can remember, and of course I love you, but… I don't know. You kissed me up on the roof, and that was great, but then we're suddenly together? I don't know, Nudge. I'd have to think about it."

She was silent for a moment. "You couldn't have brought this up two weeks ago when this whole thing started?"

"I was enjoying it too much."

"Aaron wrote me a letter," Nudge said.

"Um… really?"

"Yeah. He wrote a very heartfelt, touching letter, begging me to take him back. I was gonna turn him down, but if you and I aren't really dating, then I might just take him up on it."

She slipped out of my grasp and ducked into the cafeteria. "Nudge!" I called. But it was too late. In the cafeteria, with all the voices and footsteps, and the echoes of the voices and footsteps, I'd never find her. And she knew it.

Well, now I had an agenda. Break it down into manageable pieces. First piece: acknowledge that it was my fault. Okay. Check. I can do that.

Step two… well, step two was to fix my relationship. Not many ways to break that down. I suppose I'll just do it, then.


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26**

Fang scribbled absently at his homework, occasionally glancing at mine.

"You know, when she says 'Wherefore art thou, Romeo', she's not asking where he is," he offered.

"Oh. Really?" I said.

"Yeah. 'Wherefore' meant 'why'. Juliet is wondering why her love has to be Romeo."

"Oh, I see," I said, erasing my original answer. "Man, this play is crap. Even for Shakespeare, it's crap. I mean, they exchange two words at a party, and it's all 'marry me' and 'take my maidenhead' and 'DIE!'… cripes, it's pathetic."

"Well, you have to believe in love at first sight, Max," he said. "Don't you? How can you look at you and me, and not believe in love at first sight?"

"Fang, we grew up together," I said. "There was no 'first sight'."

"Yeah, but what did it take to fall in love?" he said, super-quietly. "Only a glance."

"Listen, Fang," I said. "You really ought to know that I don't like the kissy-face stuff."

"Fair enough," he agreed. "But you really ought to know that I love it, so that sucks for you."

I can't resist him when he's all controlling and abusive like that. We made out over our _Romeo and Juliet_ homework.

"You know," Gazzy said, "one of these days you're gonna be sucking face like that, and then you'll break apart and we'll all be dead."

I looked at him. "Yeah, well, not this particular time," I said.

"Momentarily," Gazzy assured me.

"What does that mean, momentarily?" I demanded.

"Angel foretold that the bad guys will get us," Gazzy said solemnly. "She thinks that we're all going to get caught, and that we're going to come out the worst for it."

Now Angel can foretell shit? What the hell did they stick in her DNA?

"If you haven't noticed, Gazzy, we come out the worst for pretty much everything," I said gently. "That's our life. I hate it, but it's all we have, and we're gonna pull through it."

"I don't know if I want to," he muttered.

"Ah, come here, dude," Fang said. Gazzy gently crawled into Fang's lap. "Come on, what's gotten into you?" Fang said softly. "I know it's no fun getting into fights and stuff, but I know you love inventing new weapons and blowing things up."

"Well, that's the thing," Gazzy admitted. "That's exactly it. I love stuff like that. I shouldn't! I'm not supposed to be a bloodthirsty warrior. I'm supposed to be a little kid."

A tear popped up in my eye. "Oh, Gazzy," I said quietly.

"Hey, Gaz, listen to me," Fang said. His tone was sharp and serious, and it took my breath away… of course, most of the things he says are sharp and serious and take my breath away but—oh, forget it. Anyway, the way Fang spoke to Gazzy—it was different. It was impossible to ignore.

He looked Gazzy sharply in the eye. "You listen to me. You _will_ be a little kid. Okay? I promise. I promise, on my life. There's time. There's always time. We just need to see this through."

Needless to say, at that moment I wept. Everyone knows I hate crying, but I just can't avoid it anymore. So I figured, what the hell, take it a step further from crying—weep.

"Oh my God, Fang," I muttered. "What kind of talk is that?"

"The truth," he said. "You don't agree?"

"Doesn't seem likely," I admitted. "Come on, you know as well as I do, we'll always be on the road to saving the world. Ain't never gonna reach it."

"Fine," Fang said. "But what about our daughter, Max? That's a bigger responsibility than we've had before. We can't take her along on a battle, can we?"

My hands instinctively went to my midriff. Only two and a half weeks in, I already appeared to be halfway through the pregnancy. Perhaps Mom had overestimated the length of my term.

"Look at that, out the window," Fang said suddenly.

I turned. It was Felicia and Albert. I hadn't seen them for a while. They were hanging around just outside of the flock's dorm. As we watched, Felicia reared up and looked into Albert's eyes.

"You see that?" Fang asked.

I recognized the look in their eyes; it was the same look that Fang had in his eyes before he kissed me, and presumably the look that I had in those moments as well. The only difference was, Felicia and Albert never closed the distance between them. It took me a while to make sense of it—but of course, neither of them had lips. They couldn't kiss each other. They didn't make physical contact at all. But there in their eyes, the only human features on their faces, was a kiss, plain as day.

"Wow," I said. "That's got to be criminally romantic."

"They're doing pretty good, aren't they?" Fang said. "What do you think is gonna happen to them?"

"Well, Felicia isn't exactly gonna be a soccer mom," I said, shrugging. "They've helped us, they've given us advice. They seem as trustworthy as the next guy, i.e., not at all. But maybe they really want to quit. They wouldn't be the first. Nobody chooses to be a mutant. They're probably repentant… like Ari."

"Yeah," he said. "Ari."

We sank for a moment into memories of my half-brother.

"Anyway," he said, turning back to Gazzy. "Listen, little guy. We're gonna fix this. We're gonna fix _everything_. We _will_ be normal people."


	27. Chapter 27

**All right, I'd like to make it perfectly clear that just because I'm posting a ton of chapters all at once, that's no reason to only review the last one. So, if you're reading this, review Chapter 27 **_**and**_** all subsequent chapters. And again, don't make every review about only the very last thing that happens. So, what I'm getting at here is, never hit the next chapter button before you hit the review button. Ever.**

**Once again: THIS MEANS YOU. You don't think I know about the eighteen people with this story on either their favorites or alerts? I do. I don't appreciate having more chapters than reviews, especially when I have more readers than chapters (not anymore, but I did at one point).**

**Chapter 27**

Albert strutted into the room. He was a full foot taller than Iggy and much broader, making his entrance difficult. Felicia slithered in after him, keeping her chin tightly to the ground.

"Max," Albert said. "Max, I want to talk to you."

"Sure thing, Albert," I said uneasily. "What's going on?"

He dipped his head gently. "I feel that you could benefit from a face-to-face conference with the Big Guy."

"What big guy?" I said.

"The leader of the ICBG," Albert clarified. "The chips implanted in my brain… I can send a message back to the Big Guy. I can request a meeting."

"Why would I want to meet the Big Guy?" I demanded.

_To learn,_ the Voice replied.

Oh, wonderful.

_The ICBG are your brethren,_ the Voice said.

_What the frickety-frack is brethren?_ I demanded.

_Your kin, _the Voice said. _Do you not feel the connection you have with them? They are family._

_They're trying to kill me, you stupid Voice._

_No, they aren't,_ the Voice insisted. _Please, meet with them. It will benefit, sure as the sky is blue._

_Yeah, yeah. Enough of that._ "Okay, Albert," I said. "Make your little brain-phone call. Tell the Big Guy to meet me in the canyon, completely alone."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Max, did you see where Nudge went?" Iggy asked.

"Probably the park," I said. "Don't go stalking her, Iggy."

"Have to," he said. "I can't let her go back to Aaron. I need her to know I love her."

"I think she knows, Iggy," I said. "We all love one another."

"You're just totally oblivious to reality, aren't you, Max?" he said, disgusted. "I mean, jeez. Max, I admire you more than anyone else in the world, but you're so… _blind_ sometimes. I mean, when I think about all the times you dodged Fang… When I say I love Nudge, I mean I completely, absolutely love her. She's… she's my girl. She belongs to me."

"She belongs to you?" I demanded. "I can't condone that, Iggy."

"With," he amended. "She belongs _with_ me."

"You said 'to'," I said suspiciously.

"I meant 'with'. Get off my back. Tell me where Nudge went, Max."

"The park," I repeated. "She's meeting Aaron there. By the way, for the record, I always thought that he was a bad idea on her part."

He smiled. "Thanks. Can you help me find the park? I'm not sure I know the way."

"You'll need someone else to help you with that," I said. "I have a face-to-face meeting with the Big Guy."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

I settled into the sand of the canyon, flanked by Fang, Gazzy, and Angel.

"I thought we agreed to do this alone," said a deep voice.

"_You_ alone," I said. "I'm not an idiot."

"No, you aren't," the Big Guy agreed. A giant blue gecko skittered down the canyon wall and hopped to my eye level. "It's an honor to meet you, Max. I always wanted to."

"Can't say the same," I said.

He held out a sticky, padded hand. I hesitantly shook it.

"Let's talk, Max," he said solemnly.

"Let's talk, Big Guy," I agreed.


	28. Chapter 28

**Chapter 28**

Aaron found me in the park and gave me a hug. "Nudge," he said. "It's great to see you."

"You too," I said loudly. I passed him a note: _We're trying to get Iggy to snap, so act like you mean it._

"What?" he demanded. "This was all a trick?"

"Quiet," I whispered. "He could be anywhere."

"Nudge, I do mean it," he said, clearly hurt. "I'm still in love with you."

"I still love you too," I said, raising my voice. "I'm glad you wanted to get back together."

"Nudge!" he snapped. "If you think I'm doing all this just to help you trick your boyfriend, you are dead wrong."

"Aaron, shush!" I hissed.

"Too late," Iggy said, fluttering out of a tree. "Can't believe you tried to pull a stunt like that. It would have worked if he was in on it, actually."

I giggled weakly. "Sorry about that, Iggy."

"No problem. Tell you what, I'll just tell you what I would have told you if it had worked."

I brightened. "Yeah, do that."

He got down to his knees. "Don't do this, Nudge. I'm fiendishly in love with you. Take me back, please."

"Fiendishly?" I repeated.

"I never claimed to be the adverb king," he retorted.

"AHEM!" Aaron bellowed.

I turned to him sheepishly. "Oh, hi Aaron. Look, I'm sorry. It wouldn't have worked out between us."

"It would have, Nudge," Aaron said. "Please? I love you so much. Take me back."

"Aaron, I'm not the end-all-be-all," I said. "You'll find somebody who will love you for who you are, I know you will."

"That's a cheap cop-out," he grumbled. "That could be you."

"No, it could never be me," I said. "I can only be with Iggy. That's the only option."

"No, Nudge, you can't do that," Aaron insisted. "I was abusive, I'll admit that freely. But I'll never do it again, Nudge. I love you more than this Iggy guy ever will."

I smiled sadly. "I'm sorry, Aaron, but that's not possible. Iggy is… Iggy is mine. But I don't think I ever would have known that without you, so I have to thank you. I do love you, Aaron. Can we be friends?"

Aaron glared coldly. "No," he said. "You'll never see me again." He stalked off.

Iggy caressed my face and kissed me. "Hmm," I muttered. "I don't know if I can be happy with you after I broke his heart like that. Let's show him some sensitivity. We'll probably haunt his thoughts forever anyway."

"He'll heal," Iggy assured me. "You know he will. Don't let him ruin this."

"I love you, Iggy," I said, sobbing.

"How about that date?" he said.

"Um… wanna go get some coffee?" I suggested.

"Genius. Let's do it."

I frenched him. I know that's a bit racy, but I think that all I've been through should count for a few extra years. Wouldn't you say?

The mission: get coffee. And there was nobody who was gonna stand in our way.


	29. Chapter 29

**Chapter 29**

The Big Guy and I looked each other over for a few moments.

"Why don't you take a look at this?" he said finally. He passed me a photograph. A Hispanic man in his eighties, with a white mustache but jet-black hair, captioned "Pablo Rodriguez, 2001".

"Who's this guy?" I asked.

"That's me," the Big Guy replied. "Me, hours before my experiment."

"Experiment?" I asked.

"Well, ever since I received my doctorate, I lived in a secret government facility," said Pablo/Big Guy. "I got my Ph.D. at the age of fourteen. I'm a genius, you see. A dangerous, unstable genius. I couldn't be allowed to roam in public. I was the very first prisoner in that facility when it was opened in 1919."

"Wow," I said. "So, that's, what, eighty-two years? What did you do all that time?"

"Well, it was more manageable than what you've been through," he said modestly. "They let me use my gifts, of course. I invented a lot of things, some of which are open to the public now, others of which are only available to the government…"

"Okay, wait," I said, doing some quick mental math. "You're over a hundred years old?"

"High-quality free health care," he said. "In prison. Yes, the government sucks. Anyway, in 2001 I invented a new machine… somehow, a gecko got into the mechanism. I tested it out on myself, and then… I _was_ the gecko. I could crawl up the walls, I was more dexterous and agile than anyone could ever have hoped to be. But I still had my mind. I could pick the lock on my cell, fight off the guards, release my fellow prisoners and my beautiful robot, Jewel. They all elected to go through with the same experiment, being melded with the animal of their choice, gaining all of the powers and abilities of that animal, amplified a thousand fold. Felicia, for example, can detect heat and motion with remarkable clarity. Danny, who was joined with the octopus, found the I.Q. of the brilliant mollusk combined with his own—he has the greatest mind on the planet."

"Wow," I said.

"And ever since then, we've been seeking a way to gain acceptance," the Big Guy said wistfully. "Already our minds had destined us to be locked up, and now we were mutants. And then the world discovered _you_. Truly, you have no conception about how much the world loves you. And that's all we've ever wanted—respect. Acceptance. We knew that you had it, and we hoped that with your support, we could be allies."

"Why do you call yourself the International Conglomerate of Bad Guys?" I said skeptically.

"It's a joke name," he said. "We're just seven people and a robot with very good minds… we got the name from an episode of _Chuck_. Cute show."

"I never saw it."

"It's good, you should see it," he said. "Anyway, now that we know of one another… can we begin this alliance?"

I hesitated, considering. In that moment of hesitation, we were suddenly surrounded by armored guys with giant guns.

"You son of a bitch," I said.

"I had nothing to do with this," the Big Guy said hastily. "I only wanted—I don't know who these people are. I wouldn't—"

"Tell me later," I said. "I've gotta deal with this first."

There was an insignia on the front of the armor: Chu Corporation. All right. Maybe the Big Guy was truthful.

"All right," a thin voice said. "I see a single twitch out of any of you, and the lovebirds get it."

On the edge of the canyon, the robot was there—Jewel. His highly deadly bladed hands were pressing hard into the backs of Iggy's and Nudge's heads.

"We've got 'em all, Big Guy," Jewel said.

"What do you mean, you've got 'em all?" the Big Guy demanded. "I came here to talk to Max!"

"Talk?" Jewel said. "Really? Wow. You truly are incompetent, aren't you, Big Guy? _Talking_. Give me a break. I was gonna wait until you got yourself into a position of power, but if you're gonna waste your time _talking_, then I'll just overthrow you right now."

"What are you talking about, Jewel?" the Big Guy said.

"Acceptance," Jewel sneered. "We're not here for acceptance. We're here for world domination! If I was running this operation, this would be the United Planet of Jewel-aca by now."

_Beware Jewel,_ the Voice said.

_Ya think?_ I retorted.

"It's all about Jewel, baby!" Jewel cackled. He knocked Iggy and Nudge down to the ground. "And Jewel will rewel the wewerld. Don't need these guys…"

A pulse ran through the ground, vaporizing all of the Chu thugs, but somehow sparing the flock and the Big Guy.

"And I certainly don't need you, Big Guy," Jewel said. He hopped down to the canyon floor, getting in the Big Guy's face. He was inches away… but I didn't dare go for him. He was deadly, far too deadly. No amount of dirty fighting could have given me an advantage against the foul thing.

"Don't need me?" the Big Guy fumed. "You insolent little machine! I created you! I built you! Everything you are is because of me! No one else could have invented you, only me!"

"And I'm grateful, Big Guy," Jewel said sincerely. "But your usefulness has ended. I'm smarter than you now. I don't need you anymore."

The tips of Jewel's fingers sparked with electricity.

"So, you're going to kill me, then?" the Big Guy whispered. "You're going to kill me with a weapon that I gave you as a gift?"

"You catch on quick," Jewel said. He zapped the Big Guy straight in the heart, and the giant gecko collapsed to the ground, writhing and screaming. Soon, he was motionless. He wasn't dead… it was more as if the pain was too exhausting for him to move anymore.

"I certainly don't need you bird kids," Jewel said. "Let's see how the world fares when their little protectors are all gone. I have all the allies I need right here."

Coming up behind Iggy and Nudge were three indistinct shapes.

"Fly!" Nudge screamed.

It was as good a plan as any. I grasped the hands of Fang, Angel, and Gazzy and tore out of there. Nudge and Iggy followed close behind.

Jewel shot a beam of energy at us. The pain was incredible, but I kept my wings going. I even kept my wits about me enough to catch a glimpse of the figures on the edge of the cliff.

"Brigid?" Fang blurted.

Ha-ha, I knew it. Dr. All-That was giving Fang a stare that, if looks could kill, would have stricken him with a foul disease. Cue me feeling very smug.

The other two people were both black-haired women. One of them was middle-aged and of Asian descent; I didn't recognize her.

The other was Keegan.

I gasped. No, no, it couldn't be. My friend… my first friend. She couldn't be with them.

She held out a hand to me, then withdrew it. Whatever explanation she had planned to offer, she was giving up on it. I gave her my most furious screech as the flock took to the skies.

"Are we going on the run again?" Gazzy asked.

I sighed. "Yes. Yes, we are." My eyes heated up with tears. "I'm so sorry."


	30. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30**

"That was Brigid," Fang said blankly. "Unbelievable."

"And yet believable," I said. "I saw her hanging out with Mr. Chu a while back."

"Eh, I suppose it's not that surprising," he admitted. "Never did like her."

"Oh, shut up," I said. "You thought she was the shizzle."

"And Keegan!" Fang said hastily. "That was Keegan."

"Of course that was Keegan," I fumed. "Of COURSE it was KEEGAN! Why WOULDN'T it be Keegan?! I'd just started to sorta-kinda love her. That's the immediate warning sign of a traitor. As soon as you care about somebody… bada-boom. They kill ya."

"That's not true," he said. "What about your mom and Ella?"

"They're the exception," I allowed. "Keegan was the friggin' rule. Jeb, Sam, Anne? Rule."

Several hours later, we were flying through the dark. But we weren't gonna stop. Fang and I flew, while the others slept on hammocks being dangled below us. It was a little invention we had whipped up. Fang carried the boys, I carried the girls.

"They're gonna hate me in the morning," I muttered.

"How's that?" Fang asked.

"Well, sure, they've been supportive up to now," I said. "But that was the heat of the escape. When they wake up, and we're all a little bit more calm, they're gonna start hating me. They loved the Day and Night School. They've never been _normal_ for that period of time. And I've just taken that away from them."

"It's not your fault," Fang said. "We had no choice but to get out of there."

"I'm the worst leader ever," I murmured.

"You're not," he said. "You're one of the best."

"If I was a good leader, the flock would respect me," I countered. "If my judgment was any good, you all wouldn't have had to gang up on me before going to school. Face it, there's a reason I never put my leadership up for debate. It's because I'd lose. If the flock had a real leader, we'd be in a much better place by now."

Fang thought about that for a second. "You remember that day, two years ago, when Jeb disappeared? The day you took charge. You remember that?"

"Uh-huh."

"How many people were in the flock that day?"

"Six."

"And today, right now, how many people are in the flock?"

"Still six."

"Right," Fang said. "That's all that really matters. We're all alive. That's the best possible way to lead this flock."

"Thanks, Fang," I said. We both turned sideways to exchange a quick kiss.

I suddenly heard a splash. That was a completely out-of-place sound in the sky. What could that have been? "Oh, for crying out loud," Nudge groaned. "I'm all covered in… what the hell is this?"

I felt the muscles in my abdomen tightening. "Fang?" I rasped.

"Max, what happened?" Fang said.

"The baby is coming," I said. "The baby is coming right now, Fang."

"What?!" Fang demanded. "But… but you're only eighteen days pregnant… you barely have a bump."

"Yeah, well, we never did like following normal human rules," I said, wincing. "Driving laws, education laws… the laws of physics as they pertain to water pressure."

"Yeah, we stick it to those," Fang said. "Wake up, guys! We gotta get Max to a hospital."

The other four kids were up and at it instantly. The girls didn't even make a peep about being doused in amniotic fluid.

"A hospital?" I said. "No, don't do that. Bad guys…"

"There are no bad guys at hospitals," Fang retorted.

"I don't need a hospital," I said quickly. "I'm tough. You know, in a lot of countries, they just squat down under a tree and then go back to picking rice or whatever. Just get me to the ground… I can… I can give birth real easy…" As another contraction came, I screamed. When I say I screamed, I don't just mean I screamed. I screeee-eeee-eeeeamed.

"Hospital," Fang said firmly. "First sign of lights on the ground, we're diving. Capisce?"

"Roger-Roger, Fang," Nudge said, saluting.

Suddenly, we were surrounded by lights. The lights were the eyes of M-Geeks… winged M-Geeks. Had to happen eventually.

"Dude," Fang said. "We don't have time for this."

"You are coming with us," the dumb-bots droned.

No one heard the rest of the M-Geeks' speech over my screaming. And everything went black at that moment anyway.

**Okay, reviewers, I have a special request. This is NOT a chapter about Max going into labor, it's a chapter about a heavy discussion between Max and Fang. So review **_**that**_**. Got it?**


	31. Chapter 31

**Chapter 31**

We were chained up in a brightly-lit room, the six of us. We were chained to the wall by our arms and legs, with a needle locked into our spines that completely blocked every possible kind of movement.

Max was trying not to scream. With the sedative, her movement was hindered and her contractions were infinitely more painful.

"Hey!" I yelled. "She's in labor here, you psychos! We need to get her to the hospital!"

"It's okay, Fang," she breathed. "She… she'll be born. And they'll take care of her. They're scientists. And they're not total savages. They'll take care of her."

A door opened on the ceiling, and a face popped in. "Actually, we'll not take care of her," the man said. "You will remain there chained to the wall until your death. It could take months for you to finally starve. As for your baby, she'll remain right there on the floor. Probably die instantly."

The door closed.

"Huh," Nudge said. "I guess they _are_ total savages."

I glared at her. "Was that a joke?" I demanded.

She winced. "Sorry, Fang."

"Sorry?" I sneered. "We're gonna die in here."

"We can blow bubbles with beef jerky," Gazzy said.

"None of that," I snarled.

Max huffed. "It's okay," she said. "We can… we need to talk. Our only enemy is despair! If we can… keep our morale up… we can get… out… of anything."

"We can't even move, Max," I said.

"Keep up the morale," she hissed. "Nudge, what happened with Aaron? Did you beat him up again?"

Nudge giggled. "No, I didn't. But Iggy came out, and… Aaron was pretty torn up. But, you know, there's no complications. Unless there's some big relationship fight sometime during the starvation, Iggy and I will die in love, right? Right, Iggy?"

"Shush," Iggy said harshly.

Nudge raised her eyebrows. "What was that, Iggy?"

"Shush!" Iggy said again.

I moved my eyes over to him. He had a very determined look in his sightless eyes.

"Dude?" I said.

"Leave me the hell alone," Iggy said.

Angel sniffled. "I… I was so sure we were gonna get out of this. Maybe I was wrong."

"How does that work?" Max asked.

"I don't know," Angel said. "It's just like the mind-reading thing… sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't."

I sighed, closed my eyes, and relaxed my muscles as well as I could. It didn't matter anymore. Despair as an enemy or not, there was no escaping when we were completely immobilized and unfed.

"Oh, my," Iggy said. "Oh my God, I've done it. I fuckin' did it."

"What'd you do?" Gazzy wondered.

"I have done it. Ha-ha-ha! Yeah, baby, yeah, I have DONE IT!"

I had been ignoring him, until I heard a rattling. I opened my eyes. Iggy was moving! As I watched, he struggled until he snapped the chain on his arm.

"Yes, yes, yes!" Iggy whooped. "Loving it! Does my awesomeness know any bounds? I submit that it does NOT! Praise the patron saint of skinny punks for blessing me like this!"

He reached over and broke the other shackle, then began tugging on the bindings on his feet.

"How did you do that?" I demanded.

"The sedatives that kept us from moving," Iggy explained. "They were right there between our shoulder blades, held there with a padlock. The padlock was weak; it didn't need to be strong because we were almost completely immobile. But with each teeny-tiny twitch of the shoulders, the tumblers rattled… with exactly the right tightening and twisting of the muscles, we could break the sedative off. And who has a good enough sense of hearing and touch to know if he's doing it right? Me, baby, me! Only Iggy. Only Iggy could figure this out! Ha-ha-HA!"

He was completely free. And, yes, completely awesome.

"All right, let's break the rest of y'all out of here," Iggy said cheerfully. "Ha-ha, I don't think I'll ever get over myself now."

He pulled the padlocks off of everyone else's sedatives, and in no time we were all broken out. Max needed both me and Iggy to get her free.

"How are we gonna get out?" she asked wearily. "There have got to be guards or something… I can't get past them in this state."

Iggy collected the six padlocks and needles. "No need," he said. "I can imagine that I'll whip something pretty bad-ass out of this."

Max dipped her head. She was in no condition to give orders. "Lead the way," I said to Iggy.

"Sweet," he said. He did a handstand and kicked in the trapdoor on the ceiling. The four of them filed out, followed by me and Max.

"We're gonna get out of here, Max," I whispered.

"I love you," she said. "You're… you're my soulmate. You're the end of my road. You know that, don't you?"

"None of that!" I snarled.

"Things go wrong," she rasped. "The Voice says… the Voice says I need to… make my will…"

"Your will?" I demanded. I hoisted her over my shoulder. "Max, we're getting out of here and we're going back home."

"Home?" she said. "Where's home?"

"I don't know, but we're going there and we're staying there," I said roughly.

"Fang, please… if something goes wrong…"

"Nothing's going wrong."

"Something could—"

"No."

"But I want—"

"Shut it, Max."

"Name the baby—"

"I—What? Max?"

I held her out in front of me and realized that she had passed out.

"Max?" I demanded. "What? Name the baby what?"

No answer came.

"Right then," I muttered. "You'll tell me later. You _will_ tell me later."


	32. Chapter 32

**Chapter 32**

We burst out into bright sunlight. Two dudes with guns were waiting for us, looking peaceful.

"Relax, kids," one of them said. "Remember us? The Greene brothers? We're with the CSM."

I shifted my grip on the unconscious Max. "Yeah," I said. "I remember you. Balthasar and Mattie. You guys, we need to get Max to the hospital. She's unconscious and she's in labor."

The two tough guys quickly took Max from me and loaded her into a helicopter.

"What are you doing?" I demanded. "Hey! HEY!"

The helicopter was taking off. It knocked the five of us off our feet.

"Follow it!" I roared. "I don't know if these two are on the level."

"They are," Angel said. "I'm actually a pretty good judge of character, you know."

"Well, then," I said, "I want to see the birth of my goddamn child, okay? We have to catch them."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

The helicopter landed at the hospital. The flock followed, but all the medics surrounding Max made it almost impossible to keep pace.

"What is going on?" Nudge shrieked.

I pulled a random nurse aside. "What's happening to Max?" I demanded.

"They're hooking her up," the nurse said anxiously. "We're not sure what to do. We're not exactly prepared for, ah… avian-Americans."

"You know, that's just a joke," I said. "We don't really have a politically—never mind. Where are they taking her?"

"Just follow them," the nurse said. "You'll find your Max."

My Max. Huh. Interesting term. I'll have to try that one out.

I bolted down the hallway, quickly leaving the flock in my dust. It was easy to find Max—she was the one that every single doctor in the place just couldn't wait to get a glimpse of. Assholes.

"Excuse me!" I snarled. "Let me through! That's my baby!"

I couldn't shuffle my way through the crowd. Before I was even halfway through, I heard crying.

"OH COME ON!" I bellowed. "WHAT THE HELL KIND OF PLACE IS THIS?!"

The wave of doctors started going in a different direction. "The baby's unstable," someone said. "We need to do some work on her, stat."

"Work on her?" I demanded. "What does that mean?"

I found myself drifting away on the wake of the throng of medical-types. I was prepared to follow, when a weak voice said, "Fang?"

I spun. There was Max. She was conscious again, tended by just as many doctors as were rushing down the hall with the baby. And, get this, the psycho was actually trying to stand up.

"Fang, where's the baby?" she croaked.

"I think they're taking her to the ER or something," I said. "They said she was unstable."

Max smiled and laid back on her pillow. "She'll be just fine," she said.

"What is her name?" one of the nurses asked.

Max took a deep breath. "Ari," she said. "For my brother."

"Oh, that's great, Max," I said.

"But spelled differently," she said hastily. "A-I-R-Y."

"That's beautiful," I said. "You people, clear out."

The doctors parted as I stepped up to Max. She reached out for me. I kissed her. "This is a good thing, Fang," she said. "Right?"

"It'll never get better than this, babe," I said. "There's nothing better than you and me."

**Okay. Now, listen—I posted 6 chapters today, so here's the way it's gonna be. Post 6 reviews, or don't bother at all. Until chapters 27–32 all have at least 5 reviews apiece there will be no updates. Ever.**


	33. Chapter 33

**Chapter 33**

It was dark… I remembered a lot of falling, but apart from that, I didn't know how I had gotten there.

"I see you, Max," said a singsong voice. "I know where you are. And I'm gonna get you."

"Who are you?" I demanded.

A pair of diamonds appeared in the distance. "It's me," Jewel said. "You can't escape from me. Never ever."

I saw figures dangling behind him. Iggy, Nudge, Gazzy, and Angel, hanging by their necks from a giant gallows.

I tried to look confident. "You can't kill a bird kid by hanging," I said. "Our muscles are too strong."

"Oh," Jewel said. "Well, I'd better burn them, then."

He shot a flamethrower at the propane tank sitting beneath the hanging forms of the flock. It exploded, incinerating them.

"No!" I said. "No! Fang will save me!"

"No," Jewel said. "Fang ran off to take care of your baby daughter. But I found him too."

A spotlight flew into a glass bulletproof cell. Fang was there, trying hard to keep Airy shielded.

I had never seen Airy before. There she was… a tiny little chicken-winged version of me, with Fang's coal-on-ink-on-night-sky eyes. As I watched, Jewel's four arms swirled rapidly and in perfect sync, slicing through the bodies of the two beings I couldn't live without.

"No!" I screamed. "No! I… I refuse! I'm not watching! None of this is happening!"

"Really?" Jewel said. "But the consequences are so very, very real, Max."

"What are you going to do?" I demanded weakly.

"Your job," Jewel said. "But I'm going to do it properly."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

I woke up in a cold sweat. I was still in the hospital bed, but it was now nighttime.

"Max?"

My head snapped to the corner. Jewel was there.

No… just my red sweater.

Wait, my eyes don't play tricks on me. They're too good.

Nothing there but a red sweater.

Then who had said my name?

"Max?"

I flipped over. It was Fang. He had managed to squeeze himself into the bed with me.

"What are you doing here?"

"I promised, didn't I?" he said. "I promised you'd never have to sleep without me."

I hugged him tightly. "Thank you for remembering," I said.

"Did you have a nightmare?" he said softly. Of course, he says everything softly… except for the things that he says gruffly. I don't know what I'm talking about.

"Yeah," I said. "I can't remember the last time I had such a terrifying dream…"

"It was about Jewel, wasn't it?"

"How do you know?" I demanded. "You know too much about me."

"Jewel really frightens you," he said. "You feel like we've never had to deal with anything as dangerous as him. You have no clue how we're going to survive an encounter with him, and being clueless is the scariest thing in the world for you."

"Yeah," I muttered. I suddenly snapped to attention. "He knows where we are! He sees us… he's gonna find us."

"Relax," he said. "I think if Jewel knew where we are, he'd do more about it than just messing with your dreams."

"Right," I said, finally getting my grip on reality. "Oh, Fang, it was awful. He killed all of you…"

"It wasn't real," he said.

"I know, I know…"

"No, no, listen to me," Fang said. "It wasn't real _and it never will be real_."

I sniffled. "Where's the baby?"

"Nursery," Fang said. "No one wanted to wake you… the flock are keeping a very close eye on her. No one is going to hurt our baby."

"Good," I said. "I wanna see her."

"Right now?"

"No. Tomorrow. Right now I need lots of sugar, and lots of water, and probably a bit of sex…"

"Well, I can provide all of that," he said, smiling. "Which one do you want first?"

I kissed him. "Which do you think?"

And for another twenty minutes or so, we went at it like… well, like a couple of teenagers (worst analogy ever, I know). We hadn't had sex since I realized I was pregnant… I had forgotten how wonderful it was, how much I had missed it.

"So, what does Airy look like?" I asked as we finished. And when I say we finished, I mean that he ejaculated. See, I'm not a complete verbal prude.

"She's incredible," he said. "She's a lot smaller than a normal human baby, but she doesn't look like she's premature. She actually looks really developed. She has a lot of hair and really dark eyes that started looking around at everything almost the very instant she was born. Everyone says how much she looks like me in the face, but I think they're crazy. She's completely you."

"Her wings?" I asked eagerly.

"Hard to tell," he said. "They're very downy. But I think they're mostly black like mine, with some brown speckles on them, like yours. She's absolutely beautiful, Max. The flock love being aunts and uncles. And you are gonna be the ultimate mommy."

I sighed. "I don't know if that's appropriate… being a fourteen-year-old mommy."

"You were never fourteen years old," he said. He shook his head, amused. "You've been the mommy for a long time. I think all of the hell we've been through has doubled all of our ages at the very least."

"Yeah, I guess you're right," I said. "You're always right, you pompous ass. Can we get some food, Fang?"

"I'll take you to the cafeteria right now," he said.

"Hmm… make love to me again, then we'll go."

"Absolutely, babe."

**Still want reviews for every single chapter. Gonna keep reminding you. Repetition is good for developing brains!**


	34. Chapter 34

**Chapter 34**

The Big Guy shuffled out of the cave he had crawled into. He was still shaken up.

He had a new understanding of Jewel's way of thinking. Jewel still had need of the Big Guy… for if Jewel had wanted him to die, he would have died.

Outside, the Big Guy saw Albert and Felicia keeping up a resolute guard. "Hey," he said hoarsely.

Albert helped the Big Guy to his feet. "Good to see you awake, Big Guy," he said.

"I owe you an apology," the Big Guy said. "I loved Jewel too much to see that he was becoming evil… that his beliefs, his morals, his ideals, had begun to deviate so strongly from my own… my mistake."

"Don't worry about it," Albert said.

"Do you know what's been happening?" the Big Guy asked.

"We've been in touch with Danny and the twins," Albert said. "They've been doing their best to hide from Jewel—he's casually executing people left and right. Mr. Chu and Dr. Dwyer are the only people he's kept by his side… well, and Keegan."

"Keegan?" the Big Guy repeated, unnerved.

"Yes," Albert said.

"What happened to the flock?" the Big Guy wondered.

"We don't know," Albert admitted. "I think if Jewel had located them, Danny would have received word, but I'm not sure. Could be dead, could be alive. We just don't know."

"If Jewel locates them, he'll kill them instantly," the Big Guy murmured. "I have to go after him. I have to rescind this plague that I set upon the world…" He looked up at Albert and Felicia. "What will you two do?"

"We're leaving," Albert said. "We're finding an island and we're staying there. No one in the world will ever see us again."

The Big Guy hugged Albert. "Godspeed, my friend," he said. "If you ever return to the world, I pray that it'll be a better place."

"We just might do that," Albert said.

"I remember watching the two of you in the prison," the Big Guy said wistfully. "You would just stare at each other through your cell windows all day and night. Always writing little notes… the first time the two of you made physical contact during our breakout, I felt there was true magic in the world. Will you get married?"

"A marriage doesn't mean much on a desert island," Albert said, grinning where the corners of his bird beak formed lips. "In a way, we've been married for many, many years."

Felicia coiled around the Big Guy. "Farewell, Pablo," she said. "The best of luck."

Albert hoisted Felicia onto his shoulders and flew off.

"And the best of luck to you," the Big Guy whispered.

He would bring down Jewel. He knew that he must, even if it meant bringing down the whole world with him.

**Still want reviews for every chapter! Keep chanting it in your head.**


	35. Chapter 35

**Chapter 35**

A nurse appeared, holding a tiny bundle in her arms.

"Good morning, Max," she said.

"Is that her?" I whispered.

"Here she is," the nurse said grandly. "Airy Ride."

"No," I said hastily. "No 'Ride'. Just Airy. One name."

"Okay," the nurse said. "I'll remember that. Well, here she is."

She passed the bundle into my arms. I looked down at my baby. She looked like any other three-day-old baby, except for the eyes—Fang's eyes, black as night and highly alert. She looked straight up at me. Only her eyes could move, and with her gaze locked firmly to me, she was completely motionless.

"Hi, Airy," I said. "I… I'm your mommy. Wow… you look exactly like I dreamed."

There was a gentle tap on the door. Nudge poked her head in. "Hi," she said. "We wanted to see you meet your baby."

My eyes welled up with tears. "Thanks, guys. Come here."

The four junior members of the flock crowded around me. "She's so beautiful," Angel says. "She can see you, and she knows who you are. She loves you so much."

"Yeah?" I said. "I love you too, little Airy. You're the most beautiful little baby. I love you." I kissed her gently on her forehead, feeling that if I didn't do it delicately enough a kiss would crack her head open.

"We wanted to find out if you can breastfeed her," the nurse said. "With you being part bird, we can't be sure."

I tried. Her little lips suddenly started pumping away… I could feed her all right.

"What's that?" I asked, noticing the changing table that had been rolled into the room. "What's that on the edge?"

Fang smiled. "That's her birth certificate."

"Ooh!" I said. "Let me see!"

He handed it to me. "Wow," I said. "Birth certificate. I never had one of those."

"She's off to a good start," Fang said.

"Yeah," I agreed. "Where… where are we?"

"Wyoming," Iggy said. "Smack dab in the center of the American Midwest."

I nodded. "So, we're nowhere, then? That's all you had to say. 'Nowhere'."

"Hey now," the nurse said.

I prayed that this moment wouldn't end with a cliffhanger. It was too beautiful. But it's me. So of course that's how the moment was broken.

**Still want reviews for every chapter. You better start paying attention to these, reviewing every single one from Chapter 27 onward (and before that, actually, as well) before I scoop your brains out and serve them at Thanksgiving.**


	36. Chapter 36

**Chapter 36**

The door swung open extra-slowly. "Max?" said a small voice.

Five people quickly jumped in front of me, guarding me carefully.

"Keegan," Fang growled.

Keegan held up her hands in surrender. "Please, I only want to explain myself."

"You're a traitor," I said simply. "No need to explain. I've been through the routine."

"I'm not," Keegan insisted. "I'm not a traitor. I could never hurt you, Max. I'm your friend."

"How did you find me?" I demanded.

"I can find anything," she said. "I can _do_ anything." She looked at me carefully. "When you saw me reaching out… I considered offering you reassurance. But I didn't want to take away your free will. I wanted you to form your own opinion about me."

"Right," I said. "Well, so far my opinion is that you're a sick, lying weasel."

"I deserve that," she said.

"Wait, so you would have been able to mess with my mind?" I demanded.

She shrugged. "Mess with your mind. Your body. Your existence. I can do _anything_."

"Anything?" I said skeptically.

"Yes," she said. "I was born a human, but my imagination… it runs rampant. And at one point, I discovered that with my imagination, I could do anything in the world that I wanted. I am a goddess. I am a queen. But at the same time, I'm just a fourteen-year-old girl, with all the expected frills. You know what it's like to bear that mantle."

"I'm not a goddess," I said.

"Yes you are," Keegan said. "Me? I'm powerful by sheer random chance. Everything you are ties into your destiny. You're the one who's fated to save the world, not me."

"Uh-huh," I said. "Wake me when you come up with an original line, won't you?"

"No, Max, listen to me," Keegan said. "I know more than anyone else does on this matter. I know _precisely_ who you are. I know what you're destined for." She looked at me slyly. "Jeb wouldn't approve."

I perked up. "Go on."

She winced. "I shouldn't tell you. The future… people aren't supposed to know."

I looked at her, stunned. "What are you, Keegan?"

She shrugged. "I'm a very young girl. I'm a person who likes to learn and absorb culture. I'm the person that Niles loves."

"Does Niles… does he know?"

Keegan nodded, her eyes welling up. "He does. He was the first person I ever told who I was. He's always been so sweet. He told me to… to imagine that he and I would be in love forever and ever. It was the happiest I've ever been."

I scowled. "I want to forgive you. How do I know that the only reason I love you again is because you're forcing me?"

She buried her face in her hands. "There's no way of knowing. You'll never know for sure if you can trust me. All you can do is take my word for it, and take my promise that I will never erase the doubt from your mind."

_Friendship means never having to give a reason,_ the Voice said.

"Okay," I said. "Okay. Well, I'll… I'll take that." I held out a hand to her. "Friends?"

She nodded, looking like the happiest person alive. She took my hand. "Thank you, Max. And… and this is your baby?"

"Sure is," I said. "I named her Airy."

Keegan looked down at the baby, who made perfect eye contact with her. "Hello, baby bird," Keegan said. "You are a blessed child. I imagine you living a long and beautiful life, improving the world and all of its people."

"Really?" Fang said.

"Yes," she said. "And if I imagine it… it will be."

"So, you can do anything?" Nudge said.

"Anything and everything," Keegan said.

"Then, why don't you just imagine that the world is at peace?" Nudge said. "You could imagine that there's no more global warming, no more evil corporations, no more hunger. Why haven't you done that? If you're omnipotent, then why is the world still flawed?"

"It's not my place," Keegan said. "That responsibility falls to you."

"Yeah, well, we're not gods," Fang retorted.

"That's not exactly true," Keegan said. "There's a difference between being a god and being omnipotent. I'm omnipotent… but you, the flock, you're gods. You will save the world. And I… I will observe. It's all I ever wanted to do with my life… observe."

I looked down at Airy, my precious child, then looked back up at Keegan. "Thank you," I said. "Thank you, Keegan. You've… you've inspired me. Thank you… thank you." I fought back the useless tears. "Thank you, Keegan."

She hugged me. "You're welcome," she said. "I'll always be your friend. Can you understand that?"

I nodded weakly. "Mm-hmm."

"Thank you," Keegan said. "Fang, come here."

Fang nervously approached, and Keegan pulled him into the hug. The entire flock joined in.

The family. Four people who looked up to me. One who could say that I was his, the only person in the world who could honestly claim ownership of me. One person who was mine, for I had made her right there in my body. And a friend, one friend. They were all I needed. For that brief moment, it felt like the world truly was a good place.

**Review EVERY chapter. Last time I'm gonna say that, honest. But I'm still gonna expect you to review every chapter AFTER this one. If I don't start getting more reviews, I'm gonna start using author's notes to call out individuals who have to review the entire story before there are any updates.**


	37. Chapter 37

**Chapter 37**

Life was good, but when you got right down to it we were still on the run. We knew there was no question of a fight—if Jewel found us, we would die.

After departing the hospital with Airy and bidding a tearful farewell to Keegan, we found Dr. Martinez in Denver, where we had been set to make a public appearance at a bookstore. We snuck in, well-disguised, and caught Mom backstage.

"Oh, hi, Max," she said. "I didn't expect you to show up. Are you all right?"

"Never been better, Mom," I said cheerfully. "We can't stay, but I can give a few words."

"Anything helps," she said. "Can I see Airy?"

"Right here," I said, lifting the canopy of the stroller.

"I always knew," Jeb said. I jumped out of my skin. I hadn't noticed him against the wall there. "I knew that whenever motherhood came, you'd be ready."

I nodded to him. "Sure."

I got out there with my bullhorn. Though my ad-libs occasionally got me in trouble, I had something rather decent prepared, perhaps a rapport with the audience.

"In the history of Planet Earth, there have been a number of mass extinctions," I said. "Everyone knows that. But in the past, these mass extinctions have been of a natural external cause—do we want to go down in history as the generation who actually _caused_ our own mass extinction? That would pretty much suck. Hey, you. Did you ever see _The Future Is Wild_?"

The person I had singled out looked a bit nervous. "Um, no. What's that?"

"It was on the CBC," I explained. "It's cool. It's like _Walking With Dinosaurs_, except it's about the future."

"I never saw _Walking With Dinosaurs_ either," the guy admitted.

"Really?" I said. "Wow, you must have had a deprived childhood."

"Uh, I don't think so."

"No, you did. Believe me, I know. This is coming from a girl who made up her own name and knows for a fact how to catch and eat an armadillo."

"What are you saying?" the dude demanded.

"Well, I'm just saying, we want _The Future Is Wild_ to come into reality _peacefully_. You know? If the planet is surrounded by toxic vapors, it'll be pretty difficult for life to ever come back, you know what I'm saying?"

"Oh, what are the odds of that, really?" a different dude asked.

"Pretty good, actually," I said. "At this rate? Yeah, it's gonna happen. We gotta change the rate, is what we gotta do. And, uh, why is there a tiny hole burning through the roof of the—oh, shit."

There was an explosion. Lots of lasers. Lots of blades. It's really a blur. Jewel's people worked efficiently. Almost as much as Jewel himself did.

"My associate, Dr. Dwyer, asked real nice-like that you not be killed," Jewel said cheerfully. "I like Brigid. I expect big things from her, so I'm going through with her request. You, red-shirt. Take them all. The baby too."


	38. Chapter 38

**Chapter 38**

No resistance could be offered. Jewel's blades moved too fast for the eyes. To us they appeared just a blur, meaning that normal people couldn't see movement at all. Jewel used his blades to herd us into a shiny metal box. After a few hours, the box was opened within the cargo hold of an airplane. We were alone.

"This routine again," Iggy said. "Any ideas as to where we are?"

"Cargo hold on an airplane," Fang said. "No windows. Lots of overhead lights."

"What kind of cargo?" Iggy pressed.

"Just us," Fang said. "Nothing to blow up. Max, how's the baby?"

He had been asking that almost constantly for a while. It had become his most regularly spoken phrase for his entire lifetime. "Sleeping," I said. I held her tightly in my arms and sat down in the corner of the cargo hold. "Is this how everything ends?" I wondered.

"Of course not," Fang said. "Nothing is ending."

"It is," I said. "Jewel will kill us all. You've seen him. We can't fight him! It's not possible."

"Everything has a weakness," Fang said. "If we do, then so does he."

"There's optimism and then there's idiocy," I said.

"What happened to despair as our only enemy?" Fang challenged. "That was your bit."

"Hey, if despair is Jewel's weapon of choice it's a good one," I said glumly. "Never mind all the blades and lasers and electro-shocks and—what the hell are you punk kids doing?"

What looked like a golden-brown mop attached to a blond spiky 'do broke apart to reveal Nudge and Iggy. "Hey, if this is the last time we're gonna make out, we may as well do it right," Iggy said.

"Cool," I said. "Yeah… go ahead."

"Hey, we're not gonna die," Fang insisted. "There will be plenty of opportunities to make out."

"Fang, you're wrong," Gazzy whined. "You've seen Jewel. He's… he's so evil."

"Evil," Fang said, smirking. "Like that'll give him the advantage. Hey, we hold EVERY advantage here. We've got Planet Earth backing our move!"

I stared at him. "Okay, Fang, I love you right down to the core of my soul, and our daughter is the greatest thing to ever be born, but you're being fucking insane."

"Planet Earth," Fang said. "And you know what else is backing us? Keegan. Keegan won't let anything happen to us."

The plane was landing. The cargo doors opened. Waiting for us was Mr. Chu, flanked by Brigid and Keegan. Keegan didn't emote—she probably didn't want to raise suspicion. Keegan would get us out of this.


	39. Chapter 39

**Chapter 39**

"This is the end of your road," Mr. Chu said. "All you have to do is say you support me."

"Not gonna happen," I said.

"If you do not support me, you will die," Mr. Chu said.

"Cool by me," I said cheerfully. "As long as I'm not affiliated with Dr. Super-Duper over there, death sounds all right." Brigid blinked at me, apparently unaware that I was referring to her.

"Jewel isn't here," Mr. Chu said. "He kills rapidly, painlessly. That's not my style. I might have you smothered, burned, drowned…"

"I can't drown, dude," I said. "I have gills. For some reason."

"Well, you can still smother and burn," Mr. Chu snarled. "Or, I could drop you from a great height."

"Well, now you're just being dumb," I said. "We have wings."

"Wings break," Mr. Chu said, starting to lose control. You know, I actually do enjoy his company sometimes. He's funnier than most of the old bad guys. He turns very red, and when his jaw is clenched, the veins in his neck make a very promising target. But then he suddenly went calm. "I'm not joking," he said. "Perhaps an example would get through your thick skull."

"Actually, my skull is thin," I said. "Bird bones. They're hollow."

I lost all will to wisecrack when a very, very large robot appeared from nowhere and snapped Iggy's spine. He screamed at the top of his lungs as the robot carefully broke all six of his limbs.

"Oh my God!" Nudge screamed. "You stop that!"

The robot chopped at her own limbs in rapid-fire movements, breaking her just as cleanly as Iggy.

A trapdoor opened in the floor. Somehow, I had incorrectly interpreted how high up we were—something about this place was throwing off my sense of altitude. I saw grasslands, miles and miles below.

"Maximum Ride," Mr. Chu said. "If you don't comply, you will share the fate of your flock mates."

The large robot quickly dropped Iggy and Nudge. I watched them fall and fall and fall…

"No," I whispered. "No! I don't care what you do to me! We're not working for you. I'd much rather die."

They were still falling. I looked up. "Keegan, bring them back," I said.

Mr. Chu raised an eyebrow. "Keegan? She can't bring anybody back. She's just a girl… and she's on my side."

"Keegan, please," I said. "Bring them back."

"I can't," Keegan said.

"Can't? You can do _anything_, Keegan!"

"It's not my place," she said.

Angel shrugged. "She's right about that. It's _not_ her place."

"I want to be alone with you, Mr. Chu," I said. "Can that be arranged? I think there are some things we can discuss."

"Alone?" Mr. Chu said.

I nodded. "Yep. You and me, Mr. Chu. We can discuss some terms. I'd like to know exactly what happens if I surrender."

There was silence for a few moments. Keegan glared at Mr. Chu behind his back. I understood now how she limited herself. Didn't want to alter reality, but she was willing to tweak his mind a little bit. Perhaps the only reason I understood that was because she was allowing me to.

"Very well," Mr. Chu said. "Perhaps you're not the idiot girl that I thought."

"I'm a woman, actually," I said. "Fang, hold our daughter."

Mr. Chu escorted me to a conference room. The whole place was lined with M-Geeks. They wouldn't be a problem.

From between my wings, I whipped out two large blades. "Have you ever seen a weapon like this, Mr. Chu?"

"No," he said, motioning for the M-Geeks to get into battle stance.

"They're called punch-daggers," I explained. "Ingenious, really, as far as medieval weaponry goes. You don't need any kind of training for it at all, because every single punch leaves a gigantic stab wound. Let me show you."

I jammed both blades into Mr. Chu's eyes. "That's for Iggy," I said as soon as he was done screaming. "And… what can be for Nudge? Oh, I know." I thrust the blade downward, cutting his jaw in half.

"You don't know what you've done," Mr. Chu growled. "You think this is an accomplishment? I'm just the tip of the spear. By killing me, you've done nothing but make sure that you won't survive. My death will not be forgiven. My people will _live_." He coughed, spraying blood everywhere. "That's really too bad for you, isn't it?" He fell over, dead. The M-Geeks were still motionless. Dumb mechanical bastards.

I walked out into the open, waving my bloody punch-daggers around.

"Go out this way," Brigid said, opening a door.

"Yeah, we'll listen to _you_," I retorted. "Listen, I thought you were a mega-bitch from day one. I'm not going to take _directions_ from you. Come on, guys, we're taking the down way." I pointed Fang, Gazzy, and Angel to the trapdoor. I motioned for Fang to go first with Airy, and he did.

"Max?" Gazzy said. "Is… is there any chance at all that Iggy and Nudge… didn't die?"

I looked down. "I don't think so, Gazzy." I gently held his shoulder. "With their arms and legs and wings all broken, and the giant fall… I'm sorry, little guy. I really think we've lost them forever."

He frowned. "I don't want to look for them. I don't want to see them put in a box and buried. I hope nobody ever finds them."

I smiled. "Well, you're the one who knew them best. If that's what you want, that's what we'll do."

"I'm glad they fell in love," Angel said. "That was really great. They were together all the way to the end. Maybe they're still together right now."

The flock had never really discussed religion. At least, I hadn't. It had never occurred to me to wonder what the flock had come to believe based on all their Internet surfing and TV-watching. "You believe in heaven?" I asked Angel.

She nodded. "I do. We're genetic mistakes, freaks. But in order for that to be created, there had to have been normal genetics. Those can't have come about on their own. Somebody must have written them. And whoever did that would want good things for Iggy and Nudge."

"I'm glad you think so," I said. "Now let's get out of this hellhole."


	40. Chapter 40

**Chapter 40**

I held our baby girl tightly as the Day and Night School came within our range of vision.

"Max," I said. "Max, do you see this?"

"To the ground," she said tersely. "Quick."

The four of us ducked back to the ground and approached slowly. The Day and Night School was nothing but a smoking crater.

Strike that… a smoking crater strewn with corpses. The corpses of students and teachers, and probably anyone else who had been too close at the time, seeing as every building on the property was also flattened.

"Oh no," Gazzy said. "They killed everyone at school. They… they murdered innocent, _normal_ children… trying to kill _us_ is one thing, but this is awful!"

"I think there's something to the layout of all the bodies," Max said. "Come on, back up and over."

We hopped upward. There was a layout, all right. Over 400 dead bodies, arranged artfully to spell out a message:

_GIVE UP NOW, BITCHES!_

_I WILL KILL YOU ALL!_

_KINDEST REGARDS, JEWEL_

"That evil… _thing_," I growled. "It needs to be destroyed."

"How?" Gazzy said. "It's impossible."

"No," I insisted. "There's a chance! There's always a chance! How many times have we fought our way out of impossible situations, huh? Come on!"

We fluttered to the ground. Gazzy didn't look convinced. "Impossible situations?" he said. "No. There have never been impossible situations. The mutants that were after us were incompetent. The robots were weak and cheap. The humans were… just humans. Jewel is different. Jewel can kill all of us just by waving his hand. His people already took Iggy and Nudge away. With them gone, I already feel dead."

"Fang," Max said. "Do you see a way that you can finish all of this?"

"I do," I said. That reflexive answer made me think of wedding vows… I shook my head. Not the time to think that way. "I absolutely do. I know how we can pull through this."

"Good," Max said. "Give me the baby."

I did, not understanding her harsh tone. She looked up into the sky and called out, "Keegan!"

In an instant, Keegan was at her side. "Yes?" she said softly.

Max took a deep breath. "Keegan, buddy, I'll never forgive you for letting Nudge and Iggy die. But right now I need to put that behind us. Can you make sure… can you use your imagination to make absolutely sure that no one will ever find me or Airy? Would that be within your 'place'?"

Keegan considered that, then brightened. "Yes," she said. "I can do that."

"Good," Max said. "Do it." She spread her wings. "You can go now, Keegan," she said. Keegan vanished. Max then turned to me. "Fang?"

"Yeah?" I said.

"Good luck, babe," she said. That impersonal pet name had become the most meaningful word that ever existed.

"What with?"

"Taking care of the little kids, and anything else that needs taking care of," she said. "The world isn't safe for our baby. I have to protect her." She gently began to rise into the air. "You can do these things in my absence," she whispered. "I love you so, so much, Fang. Goodbye."

She beat her wings and rocketed off into the distance.

"You're not going to follow her?" Angel asked.

"Why?" I asked. "She's the one who can fly the fastest. And besides that, Keegan's making sure she'll never be found."

"But the baby…" Angel said.

"Max knows what she's doing," I assured her, tousling her hair. "She's keeping the baby safe until things are back to… not normal, per se, but less dangerous."

Gazzy frowned. "But if Max is hiding where no one can find her, then who's going to save the world?"

I blinked. I hadn't actually thought of that. But I had known from the instant Max had called to Keegan what she'd had in mind. "Me," I said. "Until Max comes back, the protector of the world… is me."

**to be continued in the sequel, **_**In My Absence**_

**Still want reviews for every chapter. Just saying.**


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